Change my Mind
by Vampire-Badger
Summary: Sequel to Unintended Consequences. After his time in the animus, Desmond has five of his ancestors sharing his head, and he's decided that's a good thing. But when new conspiracies and new enemies threaten to tear the world apart, Desmond and his ancestors are forced apart. They will need new allies to save the world, but not all the voices in Desmond's head are friendly these days
1. Chapter 1

Desmond allows himself the luxury of waking up slowly, mumbling some half-hearted complaint against the alarm clock and reaching out an arm to hit snooze. It's been quite a while- three weeks, almost four- since he's been able to wake up in a real bed, and he's not planning to get out for anything less than a templar attack.

_"Desmond…"_

Definitely, literally, nothing. He's been on the run with Rebecca and Shaun for close to a month, thanks to a careless screw up that ended in the three of them being chased across half of the continental United States. Now that they've finally managed to make it back to a safe house, absolutely nothing is going to convince Desmond to get out of bed before at least noon.

_"Desmond, come on already!"_

Not even a particularly obnoxious ancestor banging around inside his head.

"Go back to sleep," Desmond complains aloud, rolling over and burying his face in his pillow. The voice in his head is as familiar to Desmond as his own- he's so used to his ancestors (Edward, in this case) by now that he barely even notices the intrusion.

_"I can't," _Edward says. _"I'm in your head, and you're awake. So I'm awake."_

"Then be quiet and let's both go back to sleep," Desmond says. "How about that?"

Something soft sails across the room and hits Desmond in the back of the head- he's out of bed and on his feet before his conscious mind even realizes what's happened, instincts forcing him into full awareness to process whatever threat is in front of him. Then he blinks, and sees that the soft thing is a pillow, and that Shaun is the one that threw it. The other man is glaring at Desmond from the far side of the room they're temporarily sharing. He looks about as tired as Desmond feels, but he's already out of bed and hard at work on something or other.

"What was that for?" Desmond demands, once he's finished processing the gross injustice of being out of bed several hours earlier than he'd planned.

"Please keep your disturbing mental conversations with your ancestors _inside_ your head, Desmond," Shaun says, without looking up from the stacks of papers in front of him. "Some of us are trying to work, and it's very distracting when all I can hear is half a conversation."

"Whatever," Desmond mutters, yawning and heading out for the door. Over the past couple years, he's gotten too used to working with Shaun and Rebecca to actually be bothered by Shaun's attitude. It's December of 2014- in the past twenty seven months, he's been kidnapped by templars, rescued by assassins, forced into the heads of five of his ancestors, killed (ish) by the remnant of a woman older than human civilization itself, brought back to life (minus nearly all of his memories), saved the world, had his memories restored, and then spent the next several months with the assassins.

It's a long and complicated story, one Desmond is thoroughly sick of retelling. Lately, Shaun's been asking for details on every aspect of what it's like to have someone else in his head, to have access to every single one of their thoughts and feelings, to effectively _be _that other person. He claims it's research, that what Desmond (and, occasionally, his ancestors when one of them feels like traveling through time to visit) has to say may help future animus users survive the process. Desmond isn't sure exactly how that's supposed to work, since his experience with the animus has been extremely unorthodox, but Shaun insists and it's easier to go along with him than to argue.

It's all because of the apples of Eden. Desmond, Altair, and Ezio all have an apple inside of them, linking them to each other as well as the three Kenways in a way that goes beyond what the animus normally allows. On top of that, the apples act as translators for essentially every language known to man, offer a reliable although difficult method of time travel, and frequently cause their hosts to glow.

_"Desmond!" _Edward says, interrupting his wandering train of thought.

_"What?"_ Desmond asks, letting a hint of exasperation creep into his voice. He's still upset about Edward dragging him out of bed so early. _"What could possibly be this important?"_

_"…nothing," _Edward admits, with a mental shoulder shrug that still feels strange in Desmond's head, even after all this time. _"I'm just bored."_

Desmond very briefly considers being annoyed about that, then shakes his head and smiles instead. There's just no point in being annoyed at Edward, because he either doesn't notice or straight up ignores it, depending on his mood. So he chooses to smile instead of frown, and wanders off to see if anyone's left any food lying around.

Typically, assassins are not known for their culinary prowess. The work they do is best suited to take out and microwaves, and this place is no different. Desmond finds a cabinet full of dust covered cans and (as a nice surprise) some pretty quality coffee. Over the past few months, Desmond has gotten pretty good at making something edible out of whatever happens to be on hand, and he's worked with worse than this before. By the time Rebecca and Shaun have joined him in the sorry excuse for a kitchen, breakfast is actually starting to smell pretty good (the coffee helps), and Desmond feels decidedly more cheerful.

They trade casual barbs about each other's cooking skills while they eat, with Edward providing a constant stream of commentary in Desmond's head. Despite the less than perfect accommodations, this is… nice. Before Abstergo, Desmond wouldn't have believed himself capable of trusting people the way he did Rebecca and Shaun, and the idea of a rotating cast of ancestors in his head would have freaked him out.

How quickly things change. He's trusted Rebecca and Shaun with his life so many times by now that he doesn't think twice about it anymore. And his ancestors... By now, the thought of life without them is one Desmond doesn't even want to consider. They are as much a part of him as his own arms and legs, and life without them would be… bad. Lonely. Still, as far as Desmond knows, separating them would be impossible anyway.

Definitely, literally, impossible.

**-/-**

**I very strongly recommend reading Unintended Consequences before this- I'm doing my best to explain things as I go, but that fic was pretty all over the place. It will make more sense if you read it first.**

**Next chapter: Real plot starts happening**


	2. Chapter 2

After months and years of working with it, Altair has come to think of the apple of Eden as something like a caged beast, dangerous but useful if pointed in the right direction. The one living under his skin is both a gift and a burden, but one he has grown very used to. By this point, it is a matter of barely more than a thought to activate it and cross from one century to another. He rarely does so, because it's exhausting to physically travel from one time to another- far easier to simply wake up in one of the others' minds.

But today is different, because something is wrong.

It's all the apple's fault, actually. The thing has been… restless, for want of a better word. It's not really alive (as far as he knows- first civilization technology is far from easy to understand), but it honestly feels like it's trying to force its way out of him. After a few hours of struggling to keep it under control, Altair gives up the fight and goes to consult with Desmond.

He materializes in the middle of what looks like a typical twenty first century assassin safe house. Desmond, Shaun, and Rebecca are gathered around an old, beat up kitchen table, bickering about food without any apparent ill will. As the world fades into existence around Altair, Rebecca is right in the middle of a detailed comparison between Shaun's coffee and the sewer water.

"… and the smell!" she says, almost doubled over in laughter. Across the table from her, Desmond has his face buried in his hands, shoulders shaking, while Shaun glares at both of them from behind crossed arms. "It's pretty much exactly the same, Shaun you have to admit-"

"Like rotten eggs," Desmond adds, which only makes Rebecca laugh harder.

"I admit nothing," Shaun protests. "It's not that bad!"

"It is," Altair says from behind them. During the time he'd been undercover at Abstergo, using one of their animi to relive Edward's life, Shaun had somehow managed to land a job at the coffee stand in the building's atrium. There had been several days when Altair had been forced to use the coffee as an excuse to pass information to the other assassins, and so he feels more than qualified to comment on the quality. "It is extremely terrible and you should feel ashamed of yourself as a human being."

Shaun jumps and swears, apparently unaware of Altair's arrival, and Rebecca is startled enough to stop laughing. Only Desmond looks completely unconcerned, waving a casual hello without getting up. He does stop laughing, though, when he looks up and sees the grim expression on Altair's face. "What's wrong?"

Altair doesn't answer, not out loud anyway. Instead, he holds up one arm and allows Desmond to more closely study the patterns of light marked on the skin there. It's not unusual to see the marks of the apple just after he uses it for something big, but they never look like this, shifting, pulsing, disappearing and then reappearing again even as they watch.

"Shit," Desmond says, all traces of his earlier laughter gone. "When did that start?" He stands, quickly, so that the chair he'd been sitting on bangs to the floor behind him. In an instant, he's crossed the space between them and pulled Altair's proffered arm toward him.

"This morning."

"Does it-"

"Doesn't hurt, no," Altair says, shaking his head. "But it feels sort of… off. Is yours-"

"Totally fine," Desmond says. "I haven't noticed anything. And I haven't heard from Ezio in a couple of days." Altair nods, frowning- He'd been just about to ask after Ezio, who after all is the only other one of them with an apple.

"That's so creepy," Shaun mutters, still clearly in a bad mood after the jibes about his coffee making skills.

"What is?" Altair asks, as Desmond continues to study his arm.

"You just start talking without waiting to hear the end of the sentence," Shaun says.

"Why bother waiting?" Altair asks. "I've been inside his head, I know what he's going to say."

"It's weird," Shaun mutters, but he sounds more concerned than upset.

"So…" Rebecca gets up more slowly than Desmond had, joining the other two and looking at Altair without touching, almost like she's nervous about what might happen if she tries. "What's the big deal? You guys glow all the time, it's never bothered you before."

"This is different," Desmond says. "This is… wrong. I don't know why, I can't explain it." He hesitates, eyes going distant in a way Altair recognizes as him listening to someone in his head. Then he nods, and glances over at Shaun. "Edward says it's like seeing a person with three arms, or their head on backwards."

"Accurate," Altair agrees.

"But typically graphic," Shaun says. "So what do we do now?"

"You do nothing," Desmond says. "Hold that thought, I'm going to get the others." And, just like that, he vanishes.

When he's gone, Rebecca looks at Shaun, and then back over at Altair. "This is really serious, isn't it?" she asks. "I haven't seen you all in the same place since just after Juno died."

Had Desmond been there, Altair wouldn't have bothered trying to lie. He's too well acquainted with Altair to fall for it, and too close to Rebecca and Shaun to not tell them the truth. But Desmond isn't there- he's several hundred years in the past, picking up Ezio and the Kenways. So Altair looks Rebecca straight in the eye. "It might be a big deal," he says. "Or it might be something small. Maybe I'm coming down with a cold and it's interfering with the apple, we just don't know enough about these things to know what's going on." But he doesn't really have to understand how it works to know that there's definitely something wrong. He can feel it in every inch of himself, growing more and more alarming all the time, and he doesn't like it at all.


	3. Chapter 3

When Altair had first dropped in with his apple related problems and bad news, Desmond had felt fine. When he uses his apple to stop by the eighteenth century to send (the very confused) Haytham and Connor to his own time, he starts to feel the first uncomfortable pangs of wrongness, rolling out of his gut in churning, shifting waves. When he gets to the sixteenth century and Ezio, the older assassin takes one look at him and says, "You too?"

"Yep," Desmond says. In the last quarter hour or so, he's gone from completely fine to being painted with the same twisting, dancing lights he'd seen on Altair. And, now that he's here, on Ezio. Edward has gone unusually quiet in his head, clearly affected by the same sense of wrongness that Desmond can feel. "We're meeting up in my time," he says. "To see if we can figure out what's going on. Wanna come?"

Ezio nods, but before they leave he stops to say goodbye to his wife. Desmond waits outside while the two of them have a hurried conversation inside the house- while Sophia knows the broad strokes of the kind of strangeness Ezio is involved in, there are a lot of details she hasn't been filled in on. She's never met Desmond, for instance, and now doesn't seem like a good time for introductions.

When they're done, Desmond lets his apple flare up inside him (it resists, taking longer than it should to get up to full power), carrying the two of them back home. _"What," _Edward complains. _"Don't I get to come?"_

_"You're in my head," _Desmond says. _"Close enough."_

_"Oh come on," _Edward whines. _"I can't say anything or talk to anyone-"_

_"Please, Edward," _Desmond closes his eyes as the hideout fades into reality around them. _"Every time I use the apple, it gets worse. Please don't make me come get you, too."_

And Edward doesn't argue, just glances down through Desmond's mind at the stuttering quality of the lights on his arms, and lapses into worried silence.

"Desmond," Haytham says, the second he notices him there. "Where's-"

"Edward's in here," Desmond says, anticipating Haytham's question. "Did I miss anything?"

"Altair caught us up on what's going on," Connor says, from his place wedged between the table and the wall. This is not a particularly large safe house, and with seven people crammed into the tiny kitchen, that's becoming more and more obvious. "He said his apple's acting up, and…" his eyes narrow as he takes in Desmond and Ezio. "Neither one of you looks much better."

"I don't understand this at all," Shaun announces. "Why would this just start happening? Why now?"

Desmond starts to say that none of them have any idea, and that's why they're all gathered here. They need to compare notes, see if anyone's noticed anything weird. Except that right then, the apple inside him explodes.

It has been more than two years since the apple has found its home inside Desmond. During that time, in a process so slow and gradual that Desmond has barely been aware of it, the apple has insinuated itself into every fiber of his mind and body. Every cell, every thought, every single piece of him is bonded to the apple, tightly and deeply, in a way that goes well beyond the merely physical.

And now it is bursting out of him, and Desmond feels like he's being torn apart in the process. It hurts, and Desmond is driven to all fours by the overwhelming pain. Breathing becomes a struggle, his limbs buzz and shake and then go numb, and his vision fades to a bright white haze of pain. Had there been enough air left in his lungs, Desmond would have shouted with the pain of it all, but as it is it's all he can do to keep from passing out completely.

And then the pain begins to focus. The apple's drawing into a tight ball inside him, a hard knot in the center of his chest. Desmond fights against it with everything he has, but the apple, as always, seems to have a mind of its own and no matter how hard he tries, he can't stop the apple from doing what it wants- slowly, agonizingly, the apple leaks out of him.

And then… the apple is gone. Just gone, as though it had never been there at all. The pain slowly fades, and Desmond is left in a shivering heap on the floor. He feels empty (because of the apple), and also unbearably alone- it takes him a minute or so to realize that's because Edward is gone, and he's alone in his head. But it's not until he opens his eyes, and realizes that the only ones left in the room are himself, Shaun, and Rebecca that Desmond starts to get the first inkling of just how bad things have gotten.

"Desmond?" Rebecca says, quietly, when she sees him starting to recover. "Are you okay?"

No, he's not. "I think so," he lies. "What happened?"

"Well, you collapsed," Rebecca says. Her voice is cautious, a little worried, like she already knows he won't like what she has to say. "Then Altair, and Ezio did too, and…" she stops, and her eyes drift a little to the side- Desmond follows her gaze and feels his stomach lurch as he sees three apples on the ground nearby. Even from this distance, Desmond can tell they're empty. He's not exactly sure what they're empty _of_ (he's never understood how or why the apples actually work), but they're missing whatever spark it is that makes them pieces of _Eden_ rather than pieces of _metal._

"Something drained them," Rebecca says. "Everything went kind of… golden and glowy, and then it went back to normal, and everyone else just- vanished."

No apples means no time travel. No time travel means no ancestors. No ancestors means Desmond is- he's alone, completely alone, for the first time in a long time. And Desmond has said goodbye to people before, at the farm, and in New York after running away. But none of those people ever lived inside his head- losing his ancestors literally feels like a huge part of himself has just died. His head feels too large for just him by himself, echoing and empty where there should be someone else there with him. "Shit," Desmond says, stumbling to his feet. "Someone _did_ this, Rebecca."

"Or the apples just decided to be weird again," Shaun says. "It doesn't mean someone's out to get you." Which is rich, coming from the guy that (according to Rebecca) stumbled onto the assassins through conspiracy theories.

"No," Desmond says, and he's absolutely certain of this. "Somebody outside this room took- stole the power from inside the apples. I know it."

"Seriously, Desmond?" Shaun snaps. "You do realize you sound crazy, don't you?"

"It's true."

"Who would do that?" Shaun goes on. "And how? Why?"

"I don't know!" Desmond yells back. He recognizes the anger in his voice but cannot bring himself to care, not even when his outburst startles Shaun into taking a step backward, away from him. "I don't know have any idea what just happened. That's why I'm trying to figure it out!"

"Desmond…" Shaun bites his lip, all traces of his usual flippant sarcasm chased away by Desmond's outburst. He doesn't go on from there, but his meaning is clear. Desmond, calm down, he's saying. Desmond, don't do anything you're going to regret. Desmond, _don't_.

"You don't understand," Desmond growls. "I've just lost everything important to me. Everything, Shaun! I will do whatever is necessary to get them back."

He turns his back on both Shaun and Rebecca, kicking angrily at the table leg as he passes. For several long minutes he just stands there, staring down at his own arms as if sheer willpower can make them light up again, and undo everything that's happened. He's vaguely aware of whispers behind him, but doesn't bother trying to listen to what the other two are saying. Finally, Desmond hears quiet footsteps, and feels Rebecca's hand on his shoulder.

"You're wrong," she says.

"I'm not," Desmond insists, without turning around. "I _know_ someone stole the power from the apples-"

"That's not what I meant," Rebecca says. "I mean, you're wrong about losing everything. We're still here..." she gestures between herself and Shaun. "And if you're sure that this was caused by someone else, we're going to help you undo what they've done."

Slowly, Desmond turns around to look at them- at Rebecca's worried frown, and Shaun's expression of stubborn (if slightly nervous) agreement. Slowly, the anger starts to drain away, replaced by a sick feeling of shame. It curls up inside his stomach like a wounded animal, and Desmond takes a slow, deep breath in an attempt to calm down before he answers. "I'm sorry," he says. "I just- I don't-"

Rebecca nods. "It's okay. We'll figure this out. We will."


	4. Chapter 4

Something is wrong.

One moment, Haytham had been standing in a crowded, slightly foul smelling kitchen in the twenty first century, watching helplessly as first Desmond, then Altair and Ezio collapsed to the ground in what looked like apple induced convulsions. The next, he's back in his own century with Connor and something…

_Something is wrong._

He can feel a gaping hole in his mind where his connection to the others used to be. Haytham has never had an apple of his own, but the apples are what links him to the five assassins and now that link is gone, ripped out of his mind for no reason he can understand. After several long minutes of shock, Haytham takes a deep, shuddering breath and pulls himself together the best he can.

"Dad," Connor says suddenly, the word barely more than a grunt. Haytham looks over at him, suddenly alarmed- he recognizes that tone, and it is not one he'd ever wanted to hear again. Roughly a year ago, he and Connor had ended up in an alternate timeline where some incomprehensible magics had given Connor the power to transform into a wolf, eagle, and bear. This had proved to be… bad for his mental health. Connor had only just avoided spending the rest of his life trapped as a wolf, and Haytham knows his son still fights his more animal instincts every single day.

Connor's voice now reminds Haytham of the worst days, before Connor had sworn off the transformations for good. It's entirely possible that losing the apple has shattered the fragile order of his mind, shaking loose the animals Connor has worked so hard to lock away. Haytham is at his side in an instant, hating the fear that suddenly grips him at the sound of Connor's voice. He's spent his entire life building walls around his every weakness but _damn _if Connor doesn't manage to shatter those barriers with a single word.

He doesn't know what to do or say, but Connor barely seems aware of Haytham's presence at his side. His eyes are clamped shut, and his hands are clenched into tight fists. The minutes tick by slowly, but finally Connor lets out a long, hissing sigh and opens his eyes. "I'm fine," he says, and only the slight roughness in his voice betrays the lie.

Haytham is about to argue, when the sound of footsteps on the stairs announces the arrival of the other resident of Davenport Manor- Mary Read is supposed to have died in 1721, but Desmond and Edward had saved her life instead. To avoid the potential contradiction with historical records, now she lives under an assumed name several decades later. Originally, she'd only planned to stay long enough to recover from the illness she'd picked up while imprisoned, but then again, Haytham had only planned to stay until he'd recovered from his bullet wound- neither of them has made plans to leave, despite being fully returned to health.

"Something happened," she says, stopping dead in her tracks halfway down the stairs. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," Connor snaps, and Haytham is about to open his mouth and say something about rudeness, but Mary cuts in before he has a chance. She's not the kind of woman to let someone else fight her battles for her.

"Hey," she says, marching down the stairs and over to Connor. She sticks a finger in his face and narrows her eyes. "Just because I can't time travel like the rest of you, that doesn't mean I don't have a stake in all this. What happened?"

"It's none of your business."

"Connor!"

Haytham frowns and extricates himself from the conversation as quietly as possible. Mary argues like other people breathe- it's a sort of hobby, as far as Haytham can tell. And the bickering seems to be distracting Connor from whatever's going on in his head, which is as much as Haytham can ask for.

So he leaves them to it, and wanders out of the room to think. With Mary distracting him, Connor looks a little better than he had earlier, but Haytham has been down this road before. He knows the signs, and he does not want to wake up one morning with a pet instead of a son.

And of course this could not possibly have come at a worse time. Cut off from the others, they have fewer resources to draw on than ever before. Under usual circumstances, Haytham would go to one of the other assassins to get help, but now…

The thought hits him suddenly and Haytham goes utterly still, almost as if he's been frozen, thinking over the potential consequences of his plan. He and Connor have mostly kept Ziio in the loop about what's going on in their lives, but by mutual agreement they've decided to keep out the part about the tea. They're not sure if it exists in this world, but on the off chance that it does, it goes without saying that Ziio will not approve of either of them drinking it.

On the other hand, she might possibly know how to undo whatever's gone wrong in Connor's head. Haytham nods to himself, and heads upstairs to gather his traveling gear. It takes a little less than half an hour- he is a seasoned traveler, and he tends to pack light. On the way back down, he passes Mary on her way up.

"Hey," she says, grabbing him by the arm to get his attention. "Connor told me everything. What happens now?"

"I go talk to some people that might know something," Haytham says. "Can you stay here and keep an eye on him while I'm gone?"

"Of course," Mary says. "Just… make sure you find something useful."

"I will," Haytham says. Mary loosens her grip on Haytham's arm, and he nods at her as he heads to the door. "If Connor asks, tell him I'm going to talk to his mother," he calls over his shoulder.

"To tell her that her son is in serious danger of turning into a wild animal?" Mary gives a low whistle and shakes her head. "Good luck with that."

He's halfway out the door when she shouts after him. "Oh! Hang on, Haytham-"

"Yea?"

"I was out earlier and ran into someone looking for you. An old friend, I guess, he didn't give a name." By the tone in her voice, Haytham can guess what 'old friend' means in this case.

"A templar," he says. "Here?"

"Yep."

"You didn't-"

"I exercised my self-control," Mary says. "He's still alive, you're welcome. What's he doing here?"

"I have no idea, and I don't have time to find out," Haytham says. "I'll deal with this when I get back, alright?"

"Alright," Mary says reluctantly. "But if he does _anything _threatening-"

"I know," Haytham snaps. "You're an assassin. Connor's an assassin." And Haytham… has no idea what side he's on these days. "Just try not to kill him unless absolutely necessary."

"No promises," says Mary.


	5. Chapter 5

Less than half an hour after Haytham leaves, Mary comes to drag Connor out of the house. "Where are we going?" he asks. He's in a bad mood (scared stiff, if he's completely honest with himself, terrified that he's going to lose his humanity for a second time), and the last thing he wants right now is to go outside and deal with people.

"There's a templar sitting in the tavern, bold as brass," Mary explains. "Less than five minutes from the house. I want to know what he's doing here."

"Probably drinking, if he's in a tavern," Connor says. But in the end all his protests are futile, because Mary chooses to simply ignore every argument he can come up with. "Do we have to-"

"Yes," Mary says firmly. "We have to."

By this point, she's already succeeded in dragging him outside, so Connor sighs and gives up on fighting. "So," he says instead. "Templar?"

"Yep."

"Did you tell my dad about him?" Connor asks. Haytham's current loyalties are something the two Kenways have been very carefully avoiding. It's been years since Haytham's complained about being psychically linked to a group of assassins, but he's also made it clear that he's working with them because Juno and the pieces of Eden were a bigger threat. Now that threat is gone, Connor's hesitant to ask what happens next. But if there's a templar here…

The Mile's End is crowded tonight, but Connor has no trouble picking up the spot of red in eagle vision. There's a tall man with broad shoulders and a facial scar or two sitting at the bar, nursing a drink and glowering. Connor glances at Mary, who nods. "I'll watch the door," she says. "Go talk to him."

"Just talk?"

"I promised your father something about self-control," Mary says dismissively. "Besides, half the homestead's in here tonight. I don't want to bring blades into this until absolutely necessary."

"Okay," Connor says, and he focuses his attention on the man at the bar. The gentle murmur of conversation filling the room covers Connor's footsteps as he approaches, and he uses this opportunity to more closely examine the man without being observed in return. This close, there is no doubt of the man's allegiances. The templar cross is a subtle decoration here-and-there across his clothing, and the hard set of his shoulders makes it obvious he feels uncomfortable here.

Connor slides into the seat next to the stranger and waits, face stony and impassive, for the man to say or do something. It doesn't take long- the moment Connor is settled, the stranger heaves a sigh and turns around to look Connor squarely in the face. For half a heartbeat, there's something achingly recognizable in the man's face. It's not so much his features (Connor is positive he's never seen this man before in his life) as it is his expression, and the look in his eyes. There's something there that is perfectly familiar to Connor, but then the man blinks, and frowns, and the moment passes.

"Well met," the man says, mouth quirking upward for a moment, into an expression that is not quite a smile. His voice is rough, with a definite hint of an Irish accent.

Connor is in no mood for idle chatter, though. "Who are you?" he asks. "Why are you here?"

The man rolls his shoulders and sighs (again) before draining the drink in front of him and pushing a hand into a pouch at his waist. Connor tenses, expecting a weapon, but the man only pulls out a small vial of dark red liquid. He slips it into Connor's hand before he can protest. "My name's Shay Cormac," he says. "And I'm only here to deliver that."

Neither the name nor the explanation means anything to Connor- he's never heard of Shay Cormac, and he has no idea what use the liquid in this vial is supposed to be. Everything about this is strange- in his experience, templars don't walk into assassin strongholds and offer cryptic messages and mysterious drinks. "You can't expect me to take this," Connor says, putting the vial on the bar between them. "Why would you expect me to trust you? This could be anything. Poison, or-"

"I'm not here to hurt you, Connor," Shay says, and Connor isn't sure whether to feel more confused by the tone in Shay's voice (like the very idea is ridiculous) or the fact that apparently they're on a first name basis.

"Then what exactly is… that?" Connor demands, pointing at the vial.

"A cure," Shay says.

"For what?"

"For helping you stay human," Shay says. He looks right at Connor, gaze flat and level, and Connor feels a chill run through him because Shay shouldn't know about the tea. It is literally impossible for him to know that Connor is half an unguarded thought away from growing fur, but somehow, he does.

Shay shuffles his feet, an oddly uncomfortable gesture. "I'll be going then," he says, and heads for the door, pausing only long enough to nod at a very surprised Mary on the way out. She watches him until the door closes behind him, then takes his abandoned seat next to Connor. "What did he say?" she demands. "You looked upset."

"He knows about the tea," Connor says. "I don't know how he knows, but he definitely does."

"That's impossible," Mary says dismissively. "The only people in this century that even know about that are you, me, and your father."

"And Shay Cormac," Connor says.

Mary frowns, and looks down at the vial. "So what's that supposed to be?"

"He called it a cure," Connor says, and smiles at the snort of disbelief that greets these words. "I know, it's ridiculous. Why would he want to help, even if he does know about the tea?"

"No reason at all," Mary says. "Just dump it- the stuff's probably poisonous or something."

But after a long moment of consideration, Connor shakes his head and slips the liquid into his pocket. "It doesn't hurt to hang onto," he says, at Mary's accusatory look. "It might be helpful to find out what he wants."

And- some tiny, hopeful part of him points out- there's always an outside chance that Shay is telling the truth.

**-/-**

**Shay Shay Shay Shay Shay. :) It's my first time writing him so I expect I'll get better at it as the story goes on. It doesn't help that Rogue happens before AC3, so everything that's _going_ to happen to Shay has already happened from his POV, but I haven't actually written it yet... **

**Woo hoo, time travel!**


	6. Chapter 6

"As far as we know," Rebecca says, "There are only five groups interested enough in precursor artifacts to go through the effort of stealing the energy from the apples."

"Assassins and templars," Desmond says. "But we'd know if they had the technology to do that. Who else is on the list?"

"Well, erudito," Shaun says.

"The hacker group?" Desmond asks. "I haven't heard anything about them in ages."

"Nobody has," Shaun agrees. "So they're probably not behind this."

"Then there's the initiates," Rebecca goes on.

"Who?"

"We got some intel on them a while back," Shaun says. "Your dad's been talking about recruiting some of them, actually- but I doubt most of them even understand what the first civilization is. They wouldn't want to do something like this, even if they could."

"Great," Desmond says. "So that's four of the five groups, and probably none of them are the ones that drained the apples." He scowls at the safehouse walls. "I hope the fifth group is more promising."

"Oh yea," Rebecca says, with obvious relish. "Have you ever heard of a group called the Instruments of the First Will?"

"No," Desmond says. "I think I would remember a group with a name that…" he gropes for a polite way of describing it.

"Moronic?" Shaun suggests.

"Yes," Desmond agrees. "Moronic, exactly. Who are they, anyway?"

"Remember that sage Connor killed in Abstergo last year?" Rebecca says. "John Standish?" She waits long enough for Desmond to nod, then goes on. "They're people like him- men and women crazy enough to want Juno put in charge of the whole human race."

"Oh," Desmond says. "They sound like fun people. But Juno's dead."

"And like I said, they're insane," Rebecca says. "I don't know what they're planning right now, but they're the ones most likely to be able to siphon power out of a bunch of apples."

"Crazy people with precursor ties," Desmond says. "That sounds like exactly what we're looking for."

"Which is unfortunate, because we have no idea who or where they are," says Rebecca. "I only found out about them because some people at Abstergo did some research, and I was able to get at some of that research before they locked me out."

"Great." Desmond slumps back in his chair, trying not to sound too discouraged. It's a real struggle, though- they've spent the past week trying to find out anything at all about whoever it is that had sucked out the power from the apple. So far, they have no leads and no way to get more information. Rebecca's mention of the instruments of the first will is the first hint they've had, and apparently the only people that know about them are the templars. "This is hopeless."

"We'll figure something out," Rebecca says. "We just need some time-"

"No, he's right," Shaun says. "This is going to be pretty much impossible. I mean, if this is the instruments, and I agree with Rebecca that it probably is, we'd need a lot more information just to find them. Much less take them down."

"Shaun!" Rebecca elbows him in the ribs. He responds by making a face and elbows her back.

Desmond closes his eyes and lets the familiar sound of their bickering wash over him. His mind wanders, and then suddenly he sits up. "Abstergo knows," he says.

"Sorry, what?" Shaun says. "What do they know?"

"They know about the instruments," Desmond says, looking over at Rebecca. "That's what you said, right?"

"Yea," Rebecca says, cautiously. "So?"

"So what if we get inside?" Desmond asks. "Into their computers and records, we'd find the information we need to track down the instruments."

"Yea," Rebecca says. "That would probably work, but Shaun and I have already gone undercover. Our identities are blown, we can't go back there."

"So I'll do it," Desmond says.

"Do you hear yourself?" Shaun demands. "They'll be more interested in finding you than anyone else! You walk into any Abstergo building in the world, and you're as good as dead."

"Yes!" Desmond says. Exactly!"

"What?"

"I'm as good as dead," Desmond says. "They had my body on ice for almost a year. They're never going to believe I'm still alive."

"Or that you'd be stupid enough to come back," Shaun points out.

"That too!" Desmond says, mind racing ahead. "I can go in through Abstergo Entertainment. The place was practically half assassins last year, there were so many people undercover. It can't be that hard to get in."

"They have an entire floor full of people whose job is studying you," Shaun argues."

"No, they're studying my ancestors," Desmond points out. "And Altair was in there for weeks before anyone noticed. I'll pick a different floor, it'll be fine."

"It's dangerous," Rebecca says, but she sounds less forceful than Desmond expects.

"We're assassins," he says.

Rebecca and Shaun look at each other for a long moment. "I know it's a bad idea," Shaun says at last. "But I'm having trouble thinking of new arguments."

"It would be nice to have someone on the inside again," Rebecca admits.

"Great," Desmond says.

"Hold on a second," Shaun says. "If you do this- big if- you can't go taking stupid risks once you're inside. No matter what you see there, you have to convince them you're normal. Do you think you can do that?"

Desmond nods. "I swear," he says. "I want this undone, and I know I have to be careful if I have any chance of that happening." He scowls at Shaun. "I'm not an idiot."

"Could have fooled me," Shaun says in an undertone.

Rebecca pulls out her computer and starts clicking around on something. Luckily enough," she says, "They're starting a new project within a week or two- some guy called Cormac."

"How do you know that?" Desmond asks, moving over to look at her computer screen. "That's a job board."

"Where did you think they get their employees from?" Rebecca asks. Job boards and career fairs, just like everyone else."

"That's so weird," Desmond says, watching Rebecca schedule him for an interview. "I hate thinking about them like just some normal company."

"Well they also keep dead bodies in the basement," Shaun says. "If that makes you feel any better."

Desmond manages half a laugh. "Weirdly enough, ito does."


	7. Chapter 7

In the days following his unexpected ejection from Desmond's mind, Edward is a shadow of himself. He's quiet and withdrawn, shaken from what he's experienced. It… had not been pleasant. Since he'd been in Desmond's body instead of his own, Edward had been somewhat shielded from the worst of the pain as the apple's power was drained. Unfortunately, that only meant he'd been better able to concentrate on how it had felt to be pulled away from Desmond's mind. Usually, this is not a painful process. Leaving someone else's mind is a vaguely uncomfortable sensation, but not a painful one. Even when they're not together, there's still a sense of connection.

Once, Edward had sat in a marketplace and watched a basket weaver at work. It had been idle curiosity at first, as he'd been waiting to meet with someone (a contact with worse than typical regard for timeliness), but as he watched the craftsman, he'd slowly become entranced by the sight of his quick, confident hands twining the individual strands of grass into a single object.

This time, breaking away from Desmond had felt a lot like that basket being ripped apart. The places where Edward's thoughts had woven together with Desmond's had shattered and _broken_. Pieces of his mind that never should have separated are suddenly loose and it hurts in a way that is entirely different from physical pain. The intoxicating sense of being as close to another person as possible had vanished with terrifying suddenness and Edward had been left, gasping and alone, in his own body and his own time.

He walks around for almost a week in a mood of numb detachment that worries his wife and confuses his daughter. Only his son is left completely unconcerned, but he's two weeks old and rarely worries about anything besides crying, sleeping, and shitting. The newborn provides a convenient distraction as Edward wanders the house in a daze, scarcely aware of what he's doing or saying.

The first clear memory Edward has is sitting inside the child's room, studying the crib in an absentminded way. The infant is fussing quietly, little squawks of unhappiness that make him sound like an upset seagull. For several long minutes, Edward just sits where he is, waiting for someone to notice as the fussing turns into cries, and then into screams. Finally it hits him that no one is coming, and he'll have to deal with this on his own.

He approaches the crib like a man walking toward the gallows, frowning as his son announces his extreme displeasure with the world at large by way of shrieking, noisy tears. The truth is that Edward has no idea what to do with a child- Jenny had come to him half grown already, but the boy is different. He's helpless and tiny and totally unable to deal with the world on his own. That would be enough on its own to scare Edward stiff on its own, but this infant in particular brings problems of his own, problems that so far have kept Edward far away from his son.

Because… because he _knows_ him already. He's met Haytham Kenway, he's been inside his head, he understands him, and worst of all he knows what he's been through. Haytham's life is not a happy one, and every time Edward looks at the newborn, that's all he can see. He looks down at the screaming baby in the crib and all he can think about are the horrors waiting for him in the years to come. Honestly, Edward can't even bring himself to think of this child as Haytham, because that would mean dooming this baby to that future, and that just doesn't seem fair.

The worst of it is that Edward had expected help with this. If the others were still around, he'd have a litany of voices in his head to offer advice and opinions and general mockery for the stupidity of his fears. But now he's alone, and he has no idea how to deal with this.

But the baby is still screaming and screaming, and so finally, hesitantly, Edward reaches down and gathers the infant awkwardly into his arms. He fits the space uncomfortably, chubby arms and legs flailing as he continues to scream. One tiny fist hits Edward in the chest, with all the useless force of a kitten. It surprises a smile out of him, and Edward reaches out with his thumb and runs it gently over the fuzz covering his son's head. "Some grandmaster templar you are," he says quietly. "You couldn't harm a fly, could you?"

Abruptly, the boy stops crying, staring up at Edward with an openmouthed awe that completely steals Edward's breath away. "No," he says, as firmly as he can manage, sticking a finger in the baby's face. "Don't do this to me." He hasn't been expecting to love this baby, not really, actually love him. He's going to have to look into this kid's face every day and pretend he doesn't know what's going to happen. That would be so much easier if only Edward can manage to stay unattached.

Then the baby reaches up and grabs at Edward's accusatory finger, impossibly small digits curling instinctively around it. Edward curses creatively and gives up as he feels something give inside his chest. "Damn it, Haytham," he sighs, feeling the weight of the name on his tongue as he speaks. "Why do you always have to make things difficult?"

A quiet noise at the door makes Edward turn around suddenly- his wife, Tessa, is standing there with a satisfied expression on her face. "I'm glad the two of you are talking," she says, a teasing note in her voice.

"You were waiting right outside the door, weren't you?" Edward asks.

"Maybe," Tessa says. "You've just seemed so out of it lately, and you'll barely even look at Haytham." Edward only shrugs, because trying to explain why he's been avoiding their son would require explaining a whole lot of other things he's not quite ready to talk about.

"Sorry," he says instead.

"You're a man," Tessa says dismissively. "I'd be more worried if you weren't freaking out a little. I do have to ask, why on Earth did you insist on saddling our son with a name like that?"

"It's his name," Edward says.

"It doesn't fit," she complains. "It's too… I don't know. Stiff."

"He'll grow into it," Edward says, his mind flashing back to the Haytham he knows from future. "Trust me."

"Hmm." Tessa crosses the space between them and peers into Haytham's face. "I still don't think it fits."

"Yea?" Edward says. Haytham has settled into his arms by now, apparently happy. And somehow, that makes Edward feel better, too. "What would you have named him?"

Tessa thinks this over, then nods in satisfaction. "Connor," she says. "He looks like a Connor."

"What? No. No, anything but that."

But it's too late, Tessa is smiling in a way that tells Edward she's not going to back down. "I've decided," she says. "He still needs a middle name, and I get to pick it." She leaves, still smirking, and Edward scowls exaggeratedly down at Haytham.

"When you get older," he says, "I want you to know that this is entirely your mother's fault."

**-/-**

**In canon, Haytham's middle name is Edward but oops my finger slipped.**


	8. Chapter 8

It's not until Desmond walks into Abstergo that he realizes how underprepared he is for this job. He's only been in this building twice before, but both events had been… memorable. The first time had been right after he'd been brought back to life, fleeing the building with no memories and no idea who he's supposed to be. The second time had been when they all came back together to get rid of Juno.

Now he's back for a job interview, of all things, and it's getting to him more than he'd expected it would. He's got a history with this place, and just walking through the front door sends chills crawling across his spine.

There's a man waiting for him at the front desk who takes him into an office to ask questions about Desmond's (invented) work history and career plans. The man goes through the whole process with an air of boredom that tells Desmond he's done this several times already, and then they get to the practical part of the interview. This involves actually climbing into an animus and running through a few sample memories from various people and histories. Nothing too strenuous or lengthy, just enough to see if Desmond is capable of using an animus.

He passes this with flying colors, and when he returns to the real world the first thing he sees is a pleasantly surprised interviewer and a job offer. The rest of the morning passes in a blur of paperwork, and then finally Desmond is given a tablet, an earpiece, and a desk with an animus. And that's it- Desmond spares a moment to make a mental note that he needs to give Shaun an 'I told you so' later, then pulls on his headset and logs in.

This animus is different from the ones Desmond has used before. It feels… cold. Impersonal. The ones Rebecca makes feel like they've been made for him, and technically they have. This one smells faintly of perfume, and Desmond assumes he's not the first one to use this station. Very, very briefly, he wonders about whomever had been here before him, and then decides he doesn't want to know.

This job is only supposed to be a cover, but there's a supervisor twenty feet away and maybe half a dozen others in their own stations all within eyesight. For now, Desmond decides the best thing he can do is lay low and do exactly what he's supposed to be here for- he can spare a few days for (he has to check the information on the loading screen to make sure he has the name right) Shay Patrick Cormac. By then, hopefully he'll be old news and no one will stop him from looking farther into the instruments and their interest in the apples.

But first- Cormac.

Desmond realizes he's stalling and sighs to himself before starting on the first memory. He's expecting this to feel different than it usually does, less connected to this stranger than he is to his ancestors, but to his surprise it's exactly the same as ever. There's the same creeping, pervasive feeling in his mind of a new person crawling inside and taking up root that Desmond has felt with every new ancestor. It's still just barely a prickling on the edge of his consciousness, fragile and tenuous like the first time he'd tried to sync with Altair, before either of them had an apple.

Except that this time, neither of them have an apple, and as far as he knows, Desmond isn't even related to Shay Cormac. Confused, Desmond does his best to pull back into his own mind and avoid Shay's attention. He refuses to allow himself to form a connection to the man, because he's not here to collect a new assassin to replace his lost ancestors, he's here to stay _undercover._

But there's nothing he can do to stop it now, so Desmond buries himself in the memory and just prays that it will end quickly. He can't afford to get too attached to this stranger, and not just because it would be dangerous while he's inside Abstergo. Shay seems like a nice enough guy, maybe a little too hungry to prove himself, but he's still young. He has time to grow out of that, and Desmond assumes Shay will one day be a great assassin. There's no other reason for Abstergo to be interested in the man's life, after all.

Shay's first memory plays out more or less as Desmond expects. Nothing too earth shattering happens, just a little running around and some fighting and then some sailing. All this is fine, Desmond has had quite a lot of experience in all three. But then he gets to the end of the memory, and reaches instinctively for the next one- except nothing happens. There's no memory, no more Shay, no nothing. The animus just stops working, and Desmond is ejected into the real world with little ceremony.

Alarms clang all around him, and for a terrified few minutes, Desmond assumes he's been found out. He shoots out of his chair like a startled animal, eyes snapping from place to place as he searches for the exit he should have been smart enough to look for earlier. But there's nothing, not even any windows. The only possible way out is through the elevator, and he doesn't like the idea of being shot to pieces as soon as the doors open in the lobby.

Well. This is going to be fun.

**-/-**

**It is taking me way longer than I expected to get to Shay's POV but I think we're almost there. Next chapter or the one after that, probably. I haven't decided yet.**


	9. Chapter 9

Shay spends the night facedown on a bunk- _his_ bunk, now- in the _Morrigan's _only cabin. He feels like complete and utter shite, for absolutely no reason he can understand. Liam keeps suggesting that maybe he's not as good a sailor as he claims he is, and the others seem perfectly happy to mock him for his apparent seasickness as well. But that's not what this is. Shay has never once been seasick, not even on his very first voyage on a ship as a child, or during the worst weather the ocean has to offer. He's seen plenty of others turn green around the gills, though, and he knows the signs.

This doesn't feel like seasickness at all. He's not nauseous, or vomiting. There's no sign of a headache or cold sweats. Shay just feels… disconnected from himself, and he isn't even quite sure what that means. It's just a feeling, something he can't understand or put a name to. For a very long time he just lays there, face buried in the rough fabric as he tries to center himself again. He zones out sometime just before dawn, mind wandering, and eventually he manages to slip into a sort of half sleep.

And when he gets to that point, halfway between waking and sleeping, he sees… something. The darkness behind his eyelids flashes with a bright light, and for a moment Shay sees an image there. It's there and then gone, a confusing glimpse of a brightly painted room full of equipment Shay can't even begin to identify. There's a clear air of alarm in the room, although Shay can't figure out what the emergency is supposed to be. There's no one around, and the general state of disarray tells Shay the room's occupants have fled in a hurry. Then he blinks, and the vision vanishes abruptly- Shay grunts in frustration and sits up, suddenly wide awake.

This is bullshit, and he doesn't want to deal with it right now.

"Shay?"

Liam's voice is the first indication Shay has that his friend has walked into his cabin- apparently he's been more out of it than he'd thought, since he hadn't heard the other man come in. "Liam," Shay says, without turning to look.

"You sound terrible," Liam says, a ghost of a mocking smile in his voice. "Maybe it's been a little too long since you've been aboard a ship, if a day of calm waters is enough to make you ill."

"It's not," Shay snaps. "It's- I'm fine, Liam."

Liam doesn't say anything at all to that, so Shay turns around to see his friend frowning, all signs of good humor vanished in the face of Shay's harsh words. He crosses his arms and shakes his head, like a parent that's just caught their child doing something wrong. Liam's only five years older than Shay, but the expression on his face now is one Shay is far more familiar with than he would have preferred.

"What?" he demands. The disoriented feeling of being ever so slightly out of place within his own body has started to fade, but now it's replaced with an exasperation that's far less strange. "Liam, I'm seriously okay. Go mother somebody else."

"I'm nobody's mother," Liam protests, and Shay laughs in his face. Liam looks affronted for all of half a second, and then suddenly they're back to normal, trading barbs the same way they have since they were children in New York. It's comfortable and helps Shay to relax after… whatever had happened earlier.

"Liam," Shay says, during a lull in the conversation. An idea has suddenly occurred to him. "I have a question."

"Shoot."

"Eagle vision," Shay says. It's a talent that's highly encouraged within the assassins, but he's only managed to use it for the first time a few weeks ago. "Are there ever… I don't know. Side effects? Hallucinations, or anything like that?"

"No," Liam says. "Not that I know of, why?"

Shay hesitates, before reluctantly describing the vision he'd just seen. "I thought it might be connected," he says.

Liam only shrugs. "Or you're just going crazy," he says. "Have you been sleeping well lately?"

Of course he hasn't- between training with the assassins and unexpected ship voyages, it's been weeks since Shay has really felt fully rested. The thought cheers him considerably- maybe that's all this is, just a side effect of lack of sleep. "Not well," Shay says.

"Then get some sleep," Liam says. "And let me know if you keep seeing things, alright?"

"Yes, mother," Shay says, and ducks Liam's halfhearted attempt at retaliation.

Liam sighs. "There's a couple hours left before you'll be needed on deck," he says, already halfway out of the cabin. "And I can cover for you a while longer, if you need it."

"Thanks," Shay says, and flops back down. The transition into the life of an assassin has not always been easy- Shay still isn't entirely sure how he feels about the order in general, and sometimes he feels like he just doesn't fit with the others- but having his oldest friend with him is one of the only things keeping him from just giving up in frustration.

"Don't mention it," Liam says, and finally Shay is left alone. He settles back down and closes his eyes. This time, sleep comes almost at once, but it is a restless and uneasy slumber. In the end, Shay barely gets three hours, and the entire night, his dreams are haunted by the memory of his vision from earlier. He sees it over and over again, and then wakes up feeling no more rested than he had when he went to bed.


	10. Chapter 10

Desmond's first hint that the alarms flooding the room have nothing to do with his being an assassin comes from a woman named Violet da Costa. He doesn't know that's her name at first, of course, he doesn't find that out until much later when she finally gets around to introductions. Initially, all he knows is that she is very angry about some virus Desmond has apparently released while using the animus, and that she thinks he's a monumental idiot. Violet's not the first person to express this opinion of Desmond (Shaun, for example, tells him he's a moron at least once a week, and usually more often than that), but she has a particularly annoying way of expressing her opinion.

"You were in an _animus_," she's saying just before Desmond finally snaps. "Annnnnimuuuuuus. Any of this ringing a bell?"

"Of course it is!" Desmond half shouts. He's both confused and insulted at this point, and more concerned with keeping his cover than he is in being polite. "I'm not stupid or brain damaged or anything so why don't you just tell me what's going on?"

"You, numbskull, just released a virus that's shut down every animus in this building," Violet says. "Everyone's already evacuated except for you, because it took you forever to log out- which is why I just assumed you were probably brain damaged, by the way." She pauses, then adds, "Numbskull."

"That nickname's going to stick, isn't it?" Desmond muttered. Then he went on, in a louder voice. "Look, I didn't mean to set a virus loose in your system or anything. I'm just trying to do my job, that's all."

Violet offers a rude hand gesture in response and then beckons him to follow her toward the elevator. "Come on," she says.

"Where are we going?"

"To talk to your boss, first of all," Violet says. "Melanie Lemay, you remember her?"

"It's my first day," Desmond says. "I haven't even met her yet." Technically true, although she'll be sure to recognize him if she gets a good look at his face.

"Hmm." Violet makes a face. "Lucky you."

They're coming up on the elevator by this point, so Violet doesn't get a chance to elaborate on her opinions of the boss. Desmond drags his feet a little so he ends up behind Violet, and brings one hand to cover his face. Not the best disguise, but he's out of time.

Violet and Melanie exchange a few terse words, and luckily Melanie seems too distracted by her pending computer disaster to look twice at Desmond's face. By the time he finally stops panicking long enough to actually listen to the conversation, it's too late to argue his getting drafted into fixing the whole disaster. Violet gives him a glare that would have curdled cheese, and points out that since Desmond had been the one to release the virus in the first place, it's clearly his responsibility to make things right again.

Under any other circumstances, Desmond would have argued this, but he's concerned about Melanie recognizing his voice. And anyway, he's gradually coming to realize that he's about to be locked inside an Abstergo building while almost everyone else is evacuated and sent home. The information he came here for is almost definitely locked behind layers of security, but it will be much easier to get there if no one else is around.

When Melanie finally disappears onto the elevator, Violet turns and frowns at Desmond. "Something wrong with your face?" she asks.

"Headache," Desmond lies, but he pulls his hand away and lets it drop to his side. Now that Melanie's gone, there's no point in keeping up the pretense. "So what-"

The lights cut out suddenly, only to flicker back on a few seconds later. The dull whine of fluorescent lights overhead doesn't even come close to drowning out Violet's sudden curse as she starts prodding urgently at her communicator. "The virus is hijacking other building systems," she says. "We're pretty much trapped in here until someone can figure out how to fix it."

"Great," Desmond says, not bothering to hide his lack of enthusiasm. "This should be fun."

For the first time, Violet smiles at him. It's not a nice smile, reminding Desmond more of a hungry shark than anything else. "Now you're getting it," she says.

"What am I supposed to do while I'm up here?"

"Go through as many of Shay's memories as possible," Violet says. "I don't know why, but the higher ups have decided he's important for some reason. And if you need a break, see if you can work on restoring some of your coworkers' computers."

"Will do," Desmond says, trying not to smile. Even the prospect of extra time with Shay isn't enough to tamper his excitement. He's just been given an invitation to dig through Abstergo's computers. While technically he's supposed to be helping them get their systems back online, there's no way anyone will notice him searching for the instruments while he's there. For the first time in a while, something is finally starting to go right in his life.

For a while, he skulks around looking for information on whatever computers he has access to, but without any kind of security access that does little for him. With no other choice- and with security starting to give him a hairy eyeball- Desmond finally gives in and heads back to his station, and to Shay.

He slips on a headset and starts up the simulation. For just a minute, as the world loads up around him, Desmond is met with the sight of Shay staring straight at him. It doesn't quite last long enough for Desmond to be sure it's not a glitch, and he spends way too much time trying to convince himself that's all it had been. Just a glitch, rather than a sign that his life is about to become more complicated yet again.

He completely and utterly fails- Shay had definitely been looking at him, and the only question now is _how_.

**-/-**

**Next chapter: Desmond and Shay finally meet (about seven chapters later than I expected, whoops)**


	11. Chapter 11

There's a face haunting Shay's dreams.

It's not a particularly memorable face, and if not for the fact that it's literally haunting him at night, Shay would never have taken notice. But the face haunts him for months, every single night, until Shay has every inch of that face committed to memory. It starts to drive him a little bit crazy, it robs him of sleep at night, and then somehow it becomes just a normal part of Shay's life. He stops noticing it, and the face becomes just another part of Shay's life.

And then… Lisbon.

Even before everything goes to shit, Shay can tell there's something wrong. There's a strange feeling of being watched, and Shay keeps looking over his shoulder, fully expecting to see someone there. But no matter how quickly he turns, his invisible watcher is always just out of sight, on the edge of his vision or… or _something_.

The whole thing leaves him in a foul mood, and by the time he's opened the door to the secret room where the piece of Eden is hidden, Shay is in no mood to deal with any more strangeness. He mostly just wants to grab the piece and leave as quickly as possible, but he's only taken a few steps into the room when his whole body starts to shake. There's an impossible feeling of leaving some part of himself behind, and Shay whirls around, suddenly angry beyond reason.

There's a person standing there, a person with a face that Shay knows as well as his own. This is the man that's been haunting his sleep for months now, suddenly brought to life in front of him. He's ghostly and half transparent, and when Shay takes an angry swing at him the blade passes straight through. "Who are you?" he demands, barely keeping enough control over himself to avoid making a second attack. Clearly that's not going to work, and Shay does not want to be made a fool of, not today.

The man doesn't answer Shay's question, only throws his hands up and groans. "Not again," he complains, taking several steps away from Shay and kicking uselessly at the wall. "Seriously, every single time-"

"What are you talking about?"

"Nothing," the man says, resignation and frustration warring for dominance in his voice. "Don't worry about me, I shouldn't even be here."

"Something we definitely agree on," Shay growls. "But you are here, and I want to know why."

"It's a long story and I don't have that much…" the man's eyes wander past Shay, and widen suddenly as they fix on something behind him. "Time."

Shay, curious despite himself, turns to look as well.

He's been sent here for the express purpose of finding the piece of Eden, but now that he actually turns around and sees it, the thing looks nothing like Shay had expected. As much as he's been expecting anything at all, he'd thought it would be some dusty old artifact, falling apart and reduced to nothing more than a relic by the passage of time. He's certainly not expecting to see it glowing an impossible gold, bathing himself and the stranger in a light that somehow seems to reveal both more and less than it should.

"…that's not right," the stranger says softly, walking past Shay to examine the piece of Eden more closely. Shay follows at a slower speed, too confused to even bother demanding answers a second time. The phantom stranger stops in front of the piece of Eden, leaning over so his face is only a few inches from the light. He spends a very long time examining it in silence, until finally Shay gets impatient.

"What's wrong?" he asks, because he feels instinctively that the stranger is not going to answer questions like 'who are you' and 'what are you doing here'.

"This piece of Eden doesn't feel like any of the others I've seen," the man says. "It… doesn't feel like it's really here." He sounds distracted, like he's talking more to himself than to Shay, but he answers anyway.

"It doesn't feel like anything," he says. The stranger doesn't answer this. If anything, he almost seems to be purposefully ignoring Shay, shifting a fraction to put his back to the assassin and frowning down at the piece of Eden.

Shay frowns as well. "Hey," he says. "Are you just going to sit here and pretend I don't exist?"

No answer.

"I'm talking to you!"

When this too is met with only silence, Shay gets frustrated. He reaches out without thinking, grabbing at the piece of Eden. And this at least does get a reaction from the stranger, although not the one Shay would have expected. He jumps to his feet, eyes wide, blurting a protest that comes too late. "Shay! Don't-"

His hand closes around the piece of Eden, and everything around him shatters. The piece of Eden crumbles into dust under his grasp, and Shay's vision blurs. For a second he's seeing the world from two different points of view, he's _thinking_ two different sets of thoughts. He's in both his own head and the stranger's (Desmond, he suddenly knows the man's name with a surety that almost scares Shay).

He reels backward, half falling, as his vision begins to stabilize. Shay presses his eyes closed, counts to five, and then opens them again. Desmond is gone, but this doesn't reassure him at all because-

_"How does this _always _happen? I can't go half a week on my own without stumbling into someone else's head-"_

Because he can still hear Desmond, inside his head, and it's freaking him out.

"Get out!" Shay growls. "Out!'

_"I can't! If I could, I would. I don't need this happening again."_

"What do you mean, 'again'?"

_"Shay-"_

Shay glares. Frustratingly, there's no one actually there for him to glare at, so he just narrows his eyes and stares at the wall.

_"You can be pissed at me later, but for now you should seriously think about running."_

And this is when Shay realizes that everything around him is shaking, and that the air is filled with a rumbling that can only be described as 'ominous'.

_"Earthquake," _Desmond supplies, less than helpfully. Shay is already running as fast as he possibly can. His body moves on a kind of terrified autopilot, and even as the earth rips itself below him, his mind is busy forming connections that are too terrible to be anything but true.

All this had started the moment he touched the piece of Eden. It caused all this. _He_ caused all this. Shay hears the terrified screams of people dying on the streets around him, and knows that none of this would be happening without him. If he hadn't been stupid enough to play with some ancient technology he can't possibly understand- if he hadn't blindly followed orders- none of this would be happening.

This is all his fault, and not even unexpected weight of Desmond inside his mind can distract Shay from the horror of that realization.


	12. Chapter 12

Desmond maintains his silence during the entire voyage back from Lisbon. He's well versed in the subtleties of sharing a mind with another human being, but Shay is inexperienced and clumsy and worst of all angry. He's so focused on Lisbon that he can't even think about Desmond, and that gives Desmond weeks of time to consider his next move. He has a lot to think about.

There's something inside him. Whatever artifact Shay had found in Lisbon is different from the apple, less directed but more powerful. It doesn't work the same way, and Desmond doesn't have the same amount of control as what he's used to from the apple. But if it was enough to link him to Shay, there's a chance it could help him reconnect to his ancestors. This could be exactly what he's been waiting for.

Of course, he still has the virus in Abstergo to deal with- there's literally no way out of the building until things get up and running again anyway. And Shaun at the very least will never let him forget it if Desmond gives up on his undercover work after all the time spent getting him inside. Then there's the whole process of figuring out how to reconnect to ancestors he no longer has any connection to. His problems are far from over, but at last Desmond feels cautiously optimistic that he might be able to get his life back to the way it had been.

He spends so much time dwelling on his own problems that he completely misses what's going on with Shay. There's a growing anger there that festers and grows, spreading out to envelop Shay's mind like a parasite. It's only when that anger starts threatening to encroach on the niche Desmond has carved inside Shay's mind that he sits up and takes notice. And he doesn't like what he sees.

One night out from Davenport Homestead, Desmond finally decides to speak up. He sighs, mentally prepares himself for whatever fresh new traumas this conversation is going to cause. _"Hey, Shay," _he says.

Shay's standing alone on the deck of the _Morrigan,_ which is lucky because as soon as Desmond speaks he jumps half a foot in the air and slams his palm against the wooden ship's rail so hard it nearly splinters.

_"Wow," _Desmond says. _"That seems like an overreaction."_

"I have a ghost in my head," Shay snaps. "I don't think this is overreacting at all."

_"I'm not a ghost," _Desmond protests.

"I don't care."

A passing deckhand gives Shay a startled look and hurries away.

_"You don't have to say anything out loud," _Desmond says, as Shay watches the sailor hurry away. _"Just stick to thinking things, and people will be less likely to decide you're crazy."_

"That's not happening," Shay says. "Go away, Desmond."

_"I can't."_

"Then stop talking."

His voice is cold and blank, and Desmond recognizes for the first time that Shay is stealing himself to do something he does not want to go through with. He dives into the man's thoughts a little more deeply, and comes to the only possible conclusion.

_"You're going to leave the assassins," _Desmond says.

"I said go away!"

Shay lashes out with an anger that burns at Desmond's mind, burns _cold_ like ice and winter. This is nothing like Desmond has felt before from anyone else's mind. Right now, with his mind fully occupied with the realization that people he had trusted had ordered him to do something that had indirectly led to so many deaths, Desmond is just an obstacle getting in the way of his planned escape.

…and Desmond can't entirely blame him. He'd run from the assassins himself, after all. When he was sixteen and felt like his whole future was being stolen by his father and his insane conspiracy theories. Right now, Shay is struggling to accept that his future is gone as well. Desmond can feel the hitch in his chest every time he breathes, like a tight band closing around his lungs, and the chill of fear shaping him cold and hard. Into the kind of man that can be what Shay now knows he has to be, and do the kinds of things he knows he'll have to do.

No matter what he does, for the entire rest of his life, it will never be enough to atone for the lives he carelessly ended in Lisbon. His whole future- a future that only a few weeks ago had seemed open and free- is closing in front of him like a door slamming shut. The assassins will never offer him the chance to undo the harm he's done. That means he has to leave.

_"Shay-"_

"I told you to stop talking."

_"I get it," _Desmond says. _"I understand why you can't stay, but…"_ But Desmond can see what Shay can't see for himself. That the shock of what he's already done, accidentally, is changing him into someone that can do even worse. He hesitates, mind working furiously as he tries to think of some way to make this right again. But Shay is too set on his decision, and Desmond can only offer one thing.

_"I'll help."_

That makes Shay straighten up and take notice. A sharp jab of curiosity prods in Desmond's general direction, and finally Shay thinks his next comment instead of speaking out loud. _"Why would you want to help?" _he asks, poking cautiously at Desmond's memories, skimming along the surface of his thoughts as if he's half afraid Desmond will shatter under the pressure. _"You're an assassin."_

_"Well yea, but listen," _Desmond says. _"I've done this before."_

_"What, left the assassins?"_

_"Well- yea, actually," _Desmond admits. _"But I meant I've been in other peoples' heads before."_

_"Sure," _Shay sighs, with the air of a man giving up on his sanity. _"Why not? But what does that have to _

_"Short of any obnoxious surprises-" _something painful twists in his gut at the memory of everyone he's lost. _"We're going to be stuck together indefinitely."_

_"Perfect," _Shay snaps, in a voice that tells Desmond it's anything but. _"I don't need this right now."_

_"I know. But we don't have to be enemies." _And he's not entirely happy with what happened in Lisbon himself. There have been many times throughout history when Desmond could have said with absolute certainty that the assassins are doing the right thing. This is not one of those times. What happened in Lisbon is a terrible tragedy, one that could and should have been prevented.

He can feel Shay thinking this offer over, thawing a little as he considers. Walls that he's subconsciously put up between himself and Desmond start to fall a little, and Desmond is surprised at the trembling, reaching loneliness he can feel there. _"Okay," _Shay says. _"There are some things I need to take from the house when we get there."_

_"And then?"_

_"I don't know," _Shay admits. _"I hadn't thought that far ahead. I just want to leave before anything else goes wrong."_

Desmond just barely manages to keep himself from pointing out that something always goes wrong. Unsurprisingly, it does- of course it does. And when Shay is caught and sent fleeing through the night like a common criminal, Desmond feels the sting of betrayal as strongly as Shay does.

In the end, the other assassins corner them on the edge of a cliff, and Shay is left with nowhere to run and over a dozen weapons pointed straight at him. Desmond catches him looking down, and curses. _"Shay," _he protests. _"Shay, don't jump, there's got to be another way-"_

But it's too late- Shay is absolutely determined that he won't be taken alive, and before Desmond can say another word, he jumps. They're falling and falling and falling. Cold air bites at every inch of Shay's exposed skin, and the sound of a gunshot splits the air, and then Desmond is violently forced out of the animus, gasping for breath and clutching the desk in front of him as if he expects the fall to continue forever.


	13. Chapter 13

Ziio insists that Haytham bring her with him when he goes back to the homestead and Connor. He spends exactly an hour pretending he has a choice, and then buckles under Ziio's glare and pointed comments. She's livid, and angrier than Haytham has ever seen her. And that's including the time she'd found out they'd switched bodies. That had been an unpleasant conversation, but the one they have when Haytham explains about the other universe and the tea is far, far worse. Last time, Ziio had gone quiet and stern and waited for their explanation to help things make sense again.

This time, her anger is loud and sharp- Haytham only gets as far as Connor's first time drinking the tea when she stands suddenly and slaps him in the face. She screams at him, accuses him of idiocy and poor parenting and worse things, then demands to know why Haytham allowed Connor to drink the tea.

"Allow?" Haytham asks, when she pauses for breath. "I don't 'allow' Connor to do anything, he does what he wants."

"But this-" Ziio turns away from him, and Haytham doesn't like the tone in her voice at all. "Haytham, I know the tea you're talking about. We have legends about its power, and about the costs. No one drinks the tea and remains human for long." She puts her hands to her face and says nothing else for a long moment. Finally, she turns back to Haytham. "How long has it been?" she asks.

"A year," Haytham says. "Just about."

"Then he doesn't have long," Ziio says grimly. "You said his control is starting to slip."

"It is," Haytham says. Last year, when Connor had first used the powers of the tea, he'd almost been destroyed by the wolf inside him. Only Haytham going inside his head had saved him. Temporarily, apparently, and this time there's no one to go inside and save him. "He wasn't bad yet when I left, just a little distracted."

"Then we might have time," Ziio says.

"To save him?"

"To say goodbye," Ziio corrects. "Haytham, there is no cure. Eventually, this is going to beat him."

"No," Haytham says, shaking his head and stepping back. "That's not- there has to be a way." He's not even thinking about himself, at this point, even though he's had the tea as well. Instead, when Ziio shakes her head, he says, "Connor drank the tea three times."

He's already braced for the second angry outburst, and so it shocks him less this time. Still hurts, but doesn't shock. And when the glares and comments start, not long after that, it takes Haytham far less time than he'd like to admit before giving in. They travel back to the homestead in relative silence, speaking only when necessary, and once when Haytham raises the question of why Connor hadn't known better than to drink the tea.

"Very few people have heard the legends," Ziio explains, without looking at him. "We thought that burying it would keep our people safe. I suppose it had the opposite effect."

That's the last time they speak until they finally arrive back at the homestead. Mary meets them at the door, looking worried and tired.

"Where is he?" Ziio asks, before Mary can so much as open her mouth.

"Who are you?" Mary asks, eyes narrowing in suspicion. They size one another up, both totally ignoring Haytham standing three feet away. He counts to ten and tries to pretend this isn't intensely awkward.

"I'm his mother," Ziio says finally, and Mary's eyes flick sideways to confirm this with Haytham. When he nods, she grudgingly moves aside to allow Ziio inside. "Upstairs," she says. "Asleep, finally."

When the other woman vanishes upstairs, Mary looks at Haytham. "He's been getting worse," she says.

"How bad?"

"I don't know, exactly," Mary says. "He's been avoiding me. What was in that tea the two of you drank, anyway?"

"Nothing good," Haytham says.

"Did you find anything out?" Mary asks. "Is there a cure?"

"Not according to Ziio," Haytham says. Mary nods and looks down, obviously distracted- Haytham has to say her name two or three times before she looks back up at him, startled.

"What?"

"Don't… tell Ziio I drank the tea, too," Haytham says. "She's worried enough about Connor. I don't want-"

"To be shouted at?" Mary gives him a smile that's far less cheerful than she probably means it to be. "Yea, you have that look."

"What look?"

"Cowed," Mary says. Haytham opens his mouth to argue, realizes he doesn't have a leg to stand on, and closes it again.

They stand in silence, both lost in their own thoughts, and then finally Mary says, "No cure at all?"

"No."

She snorts, and pulls an unattractive face. "I knew he was full of shit."

"Who?" Haytham says. "Connor?"

"No," Mary says. "No, ah- I told you there was a templar at the tavern the day you left, remember?"

"Vaguely," Haytham says. "I had other things on my mind."

"Connor went to talk to him, and he gave him something he claims is a cure," Mary explains. "But if there isn't one, that means he was full of shit."

"Did you get a name?"

"Shay Cormac," Mary says, and Haytham raises his eyebrows.

"That's not a name I was expecting to hear," he says. "Shay was here? On the homestead?"

"Yea," Mary says. "I thought it was weird for a templar to come here too, but-"

"That's not it," Haytham says. "I just didn't think Shay would ever come back here. Bad memories."

"First name basis and cryptic comments," Mary says. "Clearly you know him."

"He's a templar-"

"I picked that up on my own, actually."

"Who started out as an assassin," Haytham finishes.

"A traitor, then," Mary says.

"Not without cause," Haytham says. "It was a complicated time. For both sides."

"So what kind of person is this Cormac?" Mary asks. "Why would he come here and offer Connor a fake cure? How would he even find out about that?"

Haytham's mind is racing, because there's no reason for Shay to be here- the last Haytham had heard, he'd been considering retirement after a mission in France. There's absolutely no reason he could know about Connor's trouble with the tea, much less about his relapse after losing contact with the others. As to why he would want to help…

"He's a direct man," Haytham says at last. "You know about the purge during the seven years' war?"

"The one that wiped out almost ever assassin in the colonies?" Mary asks.

"Yes."

"The one that happened on _your_ orders."

"…yes. My point is that Shay was behind a lot of those deaths. He had a goal, and he set out to achieve it. He doesn't hide his intentions, and he's far from subtle. I can't say the cure he gave Connor will actually work, but I can almost guarantee he believes it will."

"And he wants to help because..?"

Haytham shrugs. "Misplaced affection? Guilt? I can't begin to understand what goes on in that man's head."

"But you don't think he came to kill Connor."

"Oh no," Haytham says. "He would have brought a knife, not poison."

Mary sighs. "That's not nearly as reassuring as you think it is," she sighs.


	14. Chapter 14

The man calls himself Juhani Osto Berg, but Desmond calls him creepy and slightly insane. He summons Desmond to his office while he's still struggling to come to grips with Shay's sudden swan dive off a cliff, which possibly explains why Desmond is so shaken during their conversation. Or maybe it's because of the man's words- he has a particular way of speaking, slow and absolutely certain, like he believes completely in every word that comes out of his mouth. It's unsettling to hear someone that is so blatantly and obviously a templar. Even without eagle vision, the way he talks would have given the man's allegiance away.

Whatever the reason for Desmond's unease, at least Berg's lecture is over quickly. Desmond barely has time to brace himself for the possibility that Berg might recognize him (he pretends to have a headache again, rubbing his hand over his face, and half seriously considers investing in a fake mustache) when the man is dismissing him and sending him on his way.

Outside, Violet is waiting with the news that the elevator is working again.

"So I'm allowed to leave?" Desmond asks.

"Not until all this is fixed," Violet says. "You break it you bought it."

"What did I buy?"

She sighs like he's the stupidest person in the world. "It's a metaphor, numbskull. You're sticking around until all this is fixed."

"Lucky me," Desmond says, and Violet laughs at him.

"Listen," she says. "Take a few minutes, go out and stretch your legs, then get back in your animus."

Desmond nods, and when Violet has turned away to focus on other work, he heads for the elevator. His first stop is the lobby, on the off chance that he'll be able to sneak out of the building, but the whole area is filled with repair crews and maintenance workers- and very obvious security guards, standing around and looking menacing- so he gives up on that option.

Back on the elevator, he pauses with his finger over the button for the second floor. Whatever piece of Eden Shay had used to accidentally destroy Lisbon had allowed him to join with Shay as if he had an apple. And, as Rebecca had pointed out when Desmond first suggested going undercover, there's a whole floor full of animi with his genetic information on them. With Violet temporarily distracted, this is a perfect opportunity for Desmond to try reconnecting with his missing ancestors.

He hits the button for the seventeenth floor instead.

The elevator ride upward is long enough for Desmond to start worrying about what will be waiting for him on the other side. There might be security, ready and waiting to attack as soon as the doors open. There might be anything at all. Or-

There might be nothing. Desmond steps off the elevator into an empty room feeling more than a little ridiculous. He's a fully trained assassin, after all. There's literally no reason to be worried about a couple of quasi trained apes with guns, but this whole day just has him completely on edge.

Quickly, as quickly as possible, Desmond finds the nearest animus and boots up the program. Luckily, whomever had been working at this station before the building evacuation hadn't bothered to log out during the alarm, so there's a chance that this won't be tracked back to him. He opens the list of ancestors and curses quietly, because the setup here is less well organized than the one he's been using to look at Shay's memories. Instead of the single option he's used to, there's a list of several ancestors to choose from. They're labelled with file numbers instead of names, so Desmond picks one at random and slips the headset on, praying that somehow this is going to be a good idea.

For a second, all he sees is the blackness of the headset pressing against his eyes, and then the darkness explodes into colors and motion and memory, flooding through Desmond's mind with a speed unlike anything he's ever experienced before. He's already been through these memories, and the machine is struggling to keep up with his high synch rate- still, Desmond catches enough bits and pieces to recognize Altair's memories before slamming with excessive but satisfying force into his ancestor's mind.

Altair is on a horse, but Desmond doesn't have the context to understand where he's going or why. He doesn't much care at the moment, either because this feels exactly right. Altair is the first ancestor Desmond had ever met. The two of them had struggled through the complexities of time travel and mind sharing together, and of all his ancestors, Altair is the one Desmond still feels closest to. This is exactly what he needs after everything he's seen with Shay.

The man is clearly not expecting his sudden reappearance, and the force of Desmond's arrival sends is enough to physically send him tumbling off his horse. He rolls several feet along the dusty ground before coming to a stop, facedown in the dirt. Desmond can feel Altair prodding cautiously at him, almost like he's not completely sure this is real, and then an uncharacteristically wide grin breaks his face in two.

_"Desmond," _he says. _"Welcome back."_

_"Glad to be back," _Desmond says. _"Only- listen, I don't know if this is permanent or not, I'm pretty much making this up as I go along-"_

_"So nothing new."_

_"Nothing new, right," _Desmond agrees. _"And I'm undercover in Abstergo, in an area where I'm not really supposed to be. I don't have much time-"_

_"Why are you-"_ Altair interrupts his own question, choosing to dig through Desmond's memories instead. Desmond winces at the expected feeling of exasperated disapproval, but before Altair can tell him he's taking too many risks, he changes the subject.

_"I need to get out before anyone realizes where I am. And you should probably get off the ground before-"_

"Altair?"

It's a woman's voice that asks the question, teasing and very vaguely familiar. When Altair regains his feet and looks around, Desmond is surprised to recognize Maria Thorpe, the woman that had impersonated Robert before Altair found the apple.

_"What is…" _Desmond trails off as several of Altair's more recent and private memories float to the surface. _"Oh. So she's your-"_

_"Yes."_

_"And my ancestor?"_

_"Apparently so."_

Desmond gives a mental huff, momentarily annoyed that while he was doing everything he could to reunite with his missing ancestors, Altair has been getting married and doing several things with his new wife that Desmond has absolutely no interest in learning more about. It's like walking in on his parents, only he has direct access to Altair's memories of events.

Before he can make any sort of comment on this- as though there could possibly be any sort of comment that would make things less awkward instead of more- the animus session cuts out abruptly and Desmond is dragged out of the animus. Literally dragged- he can feel a fist grabbing his hair, pulling him away from the desk and yanking the headset off his face.

"What the fuck do you think you're doing?" Violet snarls, and for a second Desmond completely blanks out, terrified by the possibility that he's been caught.

"I- I don't-"

"There's absolutely no reason you should be up here," Violet says.

_"Bleeding effect," _Altair snaps, and at the sound of his voice Desmond feels all the tension drain out of him. It worked. Finally, something has gone right in his life. Also it's a better lie than anything he can come up with.

"I saw something," he says, putting just the right mix of confusion and fear into his voice. "I saw- I don't know, I thought it was a person but… I followed them up here but they were gone."

Violet lets go of Desmond's hair, and he can't stop himself from reaching up to rub at his scalp. That had actually hurt. "That sounds like the bleeding effect," she says, with considerably less anger than before. "You said you just started?"

Desmond nods, and lets Violet start on an explanation that he doesn't bother listening to. Apparently, Abstergo has seen enough stupid and crazy things thanks to the bleeding effect that this doesn't even register. _"So what happens now?" _Altair asks, while Violet prattles on and on. _"Are you staying undercover?"_

_"No choice,"_ Desmond says. _"I don't have a way out, and I still need to find out more about the people that drained the apples, the Instruments of the First Will."_

_"Juno's minions."_

_"Yea. And… honestly, I feel bad about Shay. I need to see this through."_

_"I assume you already know this is stupid and dangerous," _Altair says, as Violet shows signs of wrapping up.

_"Of course."_

_"But you're going to do it anyway." _Altair says. _"Good."_

_"Good?"_

_"Whatever Shay found in Lisbon is our only way of getting the others back right now," _Altair says. _"The two of you were right there when the thing disintegrated. The energy from the artifact must have gone somewhere, and I feel pretty safe assuming it went into you and him. He's not around to use an animus, and something tells me he wouldn't be very interested in getting anyone else shoved inside his head anyway."_

_"So it's all up to me," _Desmond says. _"I can use the animi up here to get to the others, once Violet stops shouting at me." _The idea of having everyone back together is an attractive one.

They turn their attention back to the woman in question, just in time to hear her closing remarks. "I understand that the bleeding effect can be disorienting," she says. "But if I ever catch you up here, or in any other area where you're not supposed to be again…"

"I understand," Desmond says, because it's obviously expected of him. "And I'll stay where I'm supposed to be."

"Good," Violet says, and Desmond's almost sure she has no idea he's lying. "Just do what you're supposed to, and ends happily for everyone."


	15. Chapter 15

Shay wakes up, which is mildly surprising.

The last thing he remembers is a ghost in his head and a fall from the top of a cliff. Logically, he should be dead. Except that logic seems to have flown out the window. Shay opens his eyes, thinks about moving, and reconsiders when he sees the man studying him.

He resembles Desmond, and not just because they share the unusual quality of being mostly see through. They could be cousins, although this stranger looks darker. As much as a ghost can be said to have a skin tone at all.

"You're awake," the man says.

"No," Shay grumbles. "I'm going back to sleep until the world stops making sense again." He doesn't know who the man is or what he's doing here, but every muscle in his body is screaming at him that the jump of the cliff was stupid. He'd rather deal with this later, when he doesn't wish he was dead quite so much.

"Nope," the man grumbles, and Shay hears him get up and cross the room toward him. "Get up."

Shay doesn't bother to dignify this with a reply, but a moment later the stranger grabs Shay by the arm and hauls him bodily into a sitting position. He's not a big man, but he's surprisingly strong and Shay is weak as a kitten after his… accident.

"Fine!" he snaps. "Fine, I'm up, are you happy now?"

"Relatively," the man says, and smiles a little.

Something squeezes into Shay's mind, and it's familiar enough for him to recognize Desmond. _"You're back," _he says. _"Is this a friend of yours?"_

_"Family," _Desmond corrects, and Shay feels a brief surge of smugness at being right about their relationship.

_"Do I get a name?" _he asks, but instead of waiting for an answer, Shay reaches in and pulls the answer from Desmond's mind. The action forces a mental wince of pain from the other man, but Shay doesn't apologize. "Altair Ibn-la'Ahad," he says aloud, surprise and disbelief warring for dominance in his voice. Although the history of the assassins has never interested him the way the more physical parts of the training, this is a name he'd have to be completely oblivious to miss learning.

Altair nods, and Shay- completely confused by this point, and utterly unsure who he's supposed to trust- only studies him in silence. He's pretty sure that Desmond is on his side, if only because it seems impossible for the other man to hide anything from him while they're sharing one head. With enough brute force, Shay can take whatever truths he wants, and so far he seems honestly interested in helping. But everyone else, the whole rest of the world… suddenly no one at all seems above suspicion, not without careful consideration.

Altair studies Shay as Shay studies him- he's wearing traditional assassin robes, long and white with a red sash tied around his waist, carrying so many weapons Shay is surprised not to hear him clink when he moves. His hood is pooled around his shoulders, revealing a face that looks… concerned. Shay is expecting judgment or anger or disapproval, and he's not sure he knows what to do with this.

"Where are we?" Shay asks.

_"No idea," _Desmond says. _"You've been unconscious, so we haven't been here."_

"New York," Altair says, gesturing to the nearby window. "I can't give you anything more specific than that."

_"This is going to get confusing," _Shay grumbles. _"Isn't it? Never mind. It's already confusing. How do you do it?"_

_"You just get used to it," _Desmond says. _"Trust me, this is still the simple stuff."_

Shay's protest is cut off before it has a chance to form, as a man and a woman enter the room. They're strangers, but friendly enough, and it doesn't take much to realize that it's thanks to them that he's alive at all. While Shay doesn't exactly trust them, it's hard to stay completely grim while the pair bickers like the old married couple they are. What's interesting is that neither of them seem to notice Altair's half visible presence mere steps away.

Shay sighs and gets to his feet, clutching at injuries that throb with renewed pain as he moves. Altair is standing at the window by this point, gazing at the city on the other side of the pane. Shay shuffles across the floorboards to join him, struggling less with every step he takes, and leans against the wall on the opposite side of the window from the ancient assassin. "What are you thinking?" he asks, because Altair is still an unreadable mystery and worse still an assassin. _The _assassin, the one that changed the order into the one that led Shay to Lisbon.

"What's the date?" Altair asks, instead of giving a straight answer.

The question surprises Shay into answering. "I don't know," he says. "It was January of 1756 when I… when I was hurt."

_"Looks like summer," _Desmond says.

"June, maybe?" Shay says. "Or July? I don't know, why are you asking?"

"Connor," Altair says. "A… friend. He was born April 1756, so right now he's two or three months old."

Desmond laughs inside Shay's head, which feels strange but not unpleasant, like a gentle vibration. _"We should send a gift basket," _he says.

"This friend of yours," Shay says. "He's an assassin?"

Altair smiles. "Most of my friends are," he says. "I have a fairly limited social circle."

_"Don't listen to him," _Desmond says dismissively. _"He has a social circle that covers about a thousand years and most of the planet. And his wife's a templar. Or used to be, or something, I kind of missed that part."_

"Desmond…" Altair says, a flat tone of warning in his voice.

"Can you hear him?" Shay asks.

Altair shakes his head. "But you look like a man talking to the voices in his head, and I think I know Desmond well enough to assume he's saying something he shouldn't. He is, isn't he?"

"Probably," Shay says, and Altair rolls his eyes. "So what happens now?"

"That's up to you," Altair says.

_"You're in control here," _Desmond adds. _"I'm sorry we're in your head, because trust me it wasn't planned. But we're all stuck with each other now, so I guess just do whatever you would have done anyway and we'll try not to interfere too much."_

"Oh," Shay says.

_"So… what _are _you doing?" _Desmond adds.

Shay shrugs. "No idea," he says. "I thought the assassins were going to be the rest of my life but they-" he stops just before saying anything overly insulting about the assassins while there's one in his head and another one a few feet away. "…they are no longer an option. I could leave the city, go somewhere else. Just… fade away quietly."

There's a scream from somewhere downstairs, and all three of them instantly refocus.

"Or you could do that after taking are of whatever's going on downstairs," Altair suggests.

"Who am I kidding?" Shay grumbles. "Trouble just follows me."

_"You have shitty luck," _Desmond says as Shay moves to the stairs as quickly as his injuries allow, Altair following on silent, invisible feet.

"I make my own luck," Shay growls.


	16. Chapter 16

Connor exists in a state of flat out denial that what the tea has done to him is irreversible for several weeks. They're not exactly pleasant weeks, filled as they are with patches of lost time, of fur or feathers or both growing in uneven patches across his body, of forgetting things and pacing the house like the caged animal he's slowly turning into. Except that eventually, when he starts spending more time on four legs than two, when he starts thinking how easy it would be to just give up and give in, Connor has to admit to himself that something (everything) is wrong.

The others have noticed, he knows that. He can see it in their worried faces and the meaningful looks they share when they don't think he can see. They speak in hushed voices and go quiet whenever he comes into earshot.

Sometimes, his mother cries.

That's what really bothers Connor the most, because he's never seen his mother cry before. After a long, silent debate in which Connor weighs the chances of pulling his mind together on his own against the odds of a man he's never met giving him a cure that's not supposed to exist, he makes up his mind to drink the vial Cormac had left for him. Normally, he'd stubbornly insist on trying the first option until it's too late to do anything else, but he's desperate enough to try anything, now. He can't stand to watch his mother crying.

Connor leaves the house late during a night when he's feeling more human than usual, after everyone else is asleep. Everyone else has an opinion on what to do with the vial, and not one of them has been shy about sharing that opinion. Connor has listened to his mother insist that there is no cure because no cure is possible, to his father claim that Cormac is more or less a good man and that if he's decided to help Connor for some reason, he'll have made sure to do it right, and to Mary as she points out the general fishiness of the entire situation.

But in the end, it's Connor's decision to make, and he decides that Cormac's cure is his only chance at making it through this alive and still sane. Weeks ago, he'd hidden the vial in an out of the way place to deal with on his own time, and he's glad of that decision now. If this goes wrong, he doesn't want it to come back and hurt anyone else.

There's a place just north of the homestead, and for years Connor has kept a hidden cache of supplies and weapons there. The day after Cormac had given him the vial, Connor had come out here and stored it away amid the half-forgotten goods. It's not the most well secured hiding place, but that's what makes it perfect for the vial. It's so insignificant that he's simply never bothered to tell anyone else about it- there are half a dozen more spread out across the frontier, and no one would think to open this one now.

Except that someone has. Connor stops dead in his tracks, dropping to all fours in deference to instincts he can't fight. It's a cloudy, moonless night, and Connor can't make out anything beyond the general shape of a man standing against the tree next to the place where he'd hidden the vial.

"About time," the man says, and before Connor can even get through the shock of recognizing Cormac's voice, he's crossed the distance between them and pressed the vial into Connor's limp hand. He crouches down so he's on the same level as Connor, and straight up glares until Connor realizes he's staring like an idiot.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he demands, going for angry but ending at petulant.

"I mean I expected you earlier," Cormac says. "I didn't plan to be out here all night." He looks up at the sky and gives a heartfelt sigh. "It looks like rain…"

Connor looks up as well, eyeing the gathering clouds and running an absentminded finger over the vial. It does in fact look like it's going to rain. "What's the point of all this?" he asks. "Why do you even care what happens to me?"

"There's a complicated answer to that question," Cormac says. "And I don't much feel like explaining right now."

"Then how do you even know what's wrong with me?"

"You mean, how do I know that you're a logic defying werebeast slowly losing your humanity?"

"…yes."

"Also a long story," Cormac says, and the smirk on his face tells Connor he knows _exactly_ how annoying that answer is, and that he's enjoying Connor's frustration.

"Can you at least tell me how you made this?" Connor asks, nodding at the vial. "I'm not drinking this if I don't know what's in it."

"And if you'd only had that attitude before you drank a tea that gave you the mind of an animal, you might not be sitting there growling at me."

Connor realizes there's a deep rumbling sound filling the air, and that it's coming from him. He makes a conscious effort to stop, and eventually the night is silent again. "So. You expect me to just drink this, even though you won't tell me where you got this or why you want to help. Or how you knew I hid the vial here, or… or anything?"

"Yes."

They watch each other in silence for several minutes, as Connor slowly comes to the realization that nothing has changed, and Cormac's offered cure is still his only possibility of saving his own sanity. Without saying another word, Connor takes a breath, opens the vial, and drinks the entire thing down in one go.

The last thing he sees before passing out is the satisfied expression on Cormac's face.

**-/-**

**...there are some days when I love time travel, and some days when I spend like six hours trying not to make things too confusing. **


	17. Chapter 17

Desmond spends another two days in Shay's memories, watching him slowly edge toward the templar cause, testing the waters like a child wading into the ocean, waiting for Desmond or Altair to call him out on his sudden change of heart. Honestly, it's something Desmond has considered more than once, but something keeps holding him back. This isn't the first time he's had a templar in his head, after all, and Haytham had more or less turned out okay. It's not like he has any right to change Shay's mind for him, anyway.

Altair disagrees.

_"It's not right," _he says. _"I understand that Lisbon was a terrible mistake, but people do make mistakes. I don't like watching him just… abandon everything."_

_"It's his choice," _Desmond points out. It's late at night, and the building is more or less empty again. He's only half paying attention to what Altair's saying, more occupied with trying to settle enough to sleep in a building full of enemies. His desk isn't exactly designed to be slept in, but by now he's sort of used to the inconvenience.

_"How can you be okay with this?" _Altair demands. _"You've seen the same memories as me, haven't you? He's killing assassins. And he will kill more. I just…" _

He falls silent, and Desmond frowns into the empty air in front of him. _"I know," _he says. _"But what are we supposed to do?"_

_"Not let him slaughter however many people it takes for him to ease his conscience," _Altair suggests.

_"He won't listen."_

And this much, at least, Altair can't argue with. They fall into an uneasy sleep, and as Altair is back in his own time when Desmond wakes up, so there's no more talk about Shay's loyalties the next morning. Desmond groans and pulls on his headset to let the first of the day's memories wash over him.

And finds himself in the middle of a templar initiation ceremony. He stifles a mental sigh and braces himself for more of Altair's complaints when he eventually hears about this. But then, when the initial surprise wears off, Desmond realizes he recognizes the man leading the ceremony.

_"That's Haytham Kenway."_

Shay sighs. _"I know this isn't important to you," _he says. _"But it's kind of a big deal for me. I would appreciate if you could keep quiet until it's over, at least."_

And he sounds so earnest that Desmond has no choice but to watch the rest of the scene play out in silence. And mostly, he's watching Haytham. The man standing in front of him now is not the same as the one that had been there when they killed Juno last November. There's a chilling blankness in his eyes, and a condescending expression on his face that Desmond remembers from his first few times trying to synch with him. It's creepy.

But from his place inside Shay's head, Desmond can tell he has a huge amount of respect for the man. He looks at Haytham, and sees the kind of man he wants to be. Powerful, competent, and in control. Desmond, on the other hand, has a hard time liking this version of his ancestor, as Haytham seems cruel and aloof. For the first time, it really hits Desmond how much Haytham has been changed by what he's seen thanks to the animus and the apples. Maybe it's meeting Connor, or reuniting with Edward, or the new threat of Juno, but something in Haytham's future has (is going to?) restore whatever it is that's missing at this point in his life.

And thinking about this, about the difference between this Haytham and his future self, Desmond gets an idea.

_"Haytham can talk to him," _Desmond tells Altair, the next time his ancestor shows up. He's taking a lunch break, digesting a particularly unhappy set of memories and picking his way through a sandwich he'd stolen off one of the security guards. It tastes like it's been sitting in a vending machine for six months. _"He's pretty much his hero."_

Altair makes an unhappy noise, and Desmond frowns. _"What's wrong?" _he asks. _"I thought you'd be thrilled __we're trying to talk Shay around."_

_"I just don't think it's likely to work," _he says. _"And if you want Haytham to talk to Shay, you need to get him back in your head, and to do that you need to get back upstairs. And if you get caught there again, I don't think Violet's going to be as forgiving."_

_"I'll be careful," _Desmond promises, and despite Altair's ongoing protests, he takes the next available opportunity to sneak upstairs and reconnect to Haytham. With most of the security team on lunch breaks, the floor is deserted (again), and by now Desmond has days of careful observation to tell him they will not be back for at least an hour.

So, with plenty of time to spare, he dives headfirst into the first available memory of Haytham's.

He materializes, a semitransparent specter at the man's side (with Altair still safely tucked away inside his mind), only to be greeted by a chaotic scene he had not at all expected. He's on the homestead, not far off from the house. Haytham, Ziio, and Mary are in the middle of what looks like an intense conversation, and it takes Haytham over a minute to even notice him. When he finally does, he barely reacts at all apart from the way his eyes go ever so slightly wider. Then he nods and says a last few hurried words to the others before Mary and Ziio leave (still looking worried), and Haytham heads in Desmond's general direction.

_"Something's wrong," _Altair says.

_"No kidding," _Desmond says. "Haytham!" He hurries after the older man, who glances back but doesn't slow.

"Desmond," he says.

"What's wrong?"

Haytham explains in clipped, precise tones how losing the apple had caused Connor to regress away from the control he'd worked so hard to get back.

"He's… what, feral?" Desmond asks.

"Sometimes," Haytham says. "There are good days and bad days, and then last night… he vanished."

_"Where?"_ Altair demands, and Desmond echoes the question aloud.

"Well if we knew that, he wouldn't be missing," Haytham snaps. "Listen, Desmond. I'm sure there's a fascinating and unnecessarily complicated story to explain how you got here, but right now I'm much more concerned with finding Connor and bringing him back. Preferably before he goes completely insane. So help or stay quiet, I don't care which."

"I'll help," Desmond says, because clearly asking Haytham for help with Shay will just have to wait. This is not how he'd expected the reunion to go, but now that he thinks about it, he has to admit it fits Haytham perfectly. No matter how surprised he is by Desmond coming back, he'd never show it. "Obviously." He splits from Haytham, picking another direction at random.

_"So… we've clearly missed a lot," _Altair says, to cover the awkward silence that threatens to follow Haytham's reprimand.

_"He's just worried," _Desmond says. _"About Connor." _And that's way better than the Haytham from Shay's memories, so it's hard to be too upset.

Altair snorts. _"Obviously," _he says. _"And I'm worried too, and so are you, so let's focus on finding Connor first."_

Desmond doesn't say anything, just takes a deep breath and runs off. Thanks to his time in the animus, he knows what places Connor is likely to run to when he doesn't want to be found. So although it takes a while, and there are a few false starts, Desmond eventually finds Connor passed out on a cliff face next to one of the supply caches he keeps throughout the frontier.

"Shit," he says, and charges toward his ancestor at full speed.

He looks awful, pale and stiff, and that's what Desmond notices first. It's not until he reaches Connor and leans over to examine him that he notices the fur on his face and feathers on his forearms. He looks like some nightmare creature in the making, bits and pieces of different animals crawling their way across his body and (presumably) into his mind.

_"Shit," _Desmond says again, this time inside the privacy of his own mind.

_"No wonder Haytham was so worried," _Altair agrees.

_"We should get him back to-"_

And then he stiffens and freezes as a hand lands on his shoulder. There are only two people in this century that should be able to see him, much less touch him. Connor is out cold on the ground in front of him, and Haytham had gone in the opposite direction.

He turns around and does a double take so dramatic he almost falls on top of Connor. "Oh," he says, too shocked to say anything else.

_"That's Shay," _Altair says, as if Desmond hasn't already figured that out for himself. _"What is he doing here?"_


	18. Chapter 18

"I know you have questions," Shay says. "But trust me, this is not the time for answers."

"You can't just show up here for no good reason and not tell me why," Desmond argues, and Altair just barely resists the urge to add something else. Desmond doesn't need him talking in his head and distracting him while he's trying to deal with Shay. "None of this makes any sense!"

"Time travel is confusing," Shay says flatly. "And if I tell you too much, it could change the future. Your future, I mean. My past."

"Broad strokes, then," Desmond snaps. "I don't need details, just enough to know what the _fuck_ is going on here!"

Shay chews this over for a minute, then nods. "Fair enough," he says. "A while ago, you came to me and said you needed a favor."

"I did?"

"Well, you will," Shay says. "Clearly you haven't done that yet. You gave me a cure for Connor's… disease, and asked me to deliver it. So I did."

_"You know how to make Connor human again?" _Altair asks, curious despite himself.

_"Apparently I'm going to figure it out at some point," _Desmond says, sounding as surprised as Altair feels. To Shay, he says, "Why are you here now?"

"Because you also told me where and when he would actually get around to drinking that cure," Shay explains. "And you said he's going to need some help soon."

"Why would I tell you that?" Desmond asks, a note of disbelief in his voice. "I mean, of all people?"

"Probably because you're having this conversation with me now," Shay says, in answer to Desmond's question. "And if you hadn't told me to come here, I wouldn't _be _here, and you wouldn't have told me to come, and then we'd have paradoxes and it's usually best to avoid those."

_"So…" _Altair hesitates, summing everything up in his head before finally addressing Desmond. _"You have this conversation with Shay. Then later in the future, you figure out how to make Connor human again, and pass that onto him, because he told you that you would. You also tell him about what's happening now, specifically so he can come here and have this conversation now."_

_"…I guess?" _Desmond says, and shrugs.

"Don't worry," Shay says, a wry note of amusement in his voice. Apparently, Desmond isn't doing very well at keeping his confusion off his face. "Just keep doing whatever you were going to do anyway, and the timeline shouldn't get too confusing."

"Too late," Desmond mutters.

Altair is still trying to digest the complications of time travel and Shay's role in all this when Connor suddenly groans and tries (unsuccessfully) to get up. Altair tenses, suddenly hating how powerless he is without a body of his own, and Desmond scrambles back to his feet. Shay- Altair can't help noticing- pulls out a sword and frowns at Connor.

"Whoa!" Desmond protests, focusing into the sword as well. "What are you planning to do with that?"

"Just wait," Shay says quietly. "Something doesn't feel right."

Connor starts to convulse on the ground, and Altair shudders at the pained noises coming from him. Shay doesn't move but he swears loudly and shifts the grip on his sword so he's holding it in a more threatening position. Clearly, he hadn't been told to expect this.

"What did you give him?" Desmond demands.

"I have no idea!" Shay protests. "I got it from you first, remember?"

"I never gave you anything!"

"Not _yet_," Shay snaps.

_"Sorry to interrupt," _Altair says. _"But you need to get out of here, Desmond."_

_"What? No! Not with Connor like this!"_

And while Altair completely understands why Desmond would want to stay with Connor, the unhappy truth is that there's no way for him to do anything to help, not in the state he is now. Desmond isn't of this time, he's only here because he'd used the animus to get inside Haytham's mind. He hasn't been back in Connor's since having the apples drained, and as far as Altair understands it, that means Connor won't be able to see or hear him, just as neither Mary nor Ziio had been able to see or hear him earlier.

_"You have to," _Altair insists, and they're sharing the same mind- Desmond looks into his thoughts and understands Altair's reasoning without either of them needing to say a word.

"I'm going to get Haytham," Desmond says, and bolts as soon as he sees Shay's answering nod. _"This sucks," _he complains to Altair as they run.

_"I know."_

_"We just left him there!"_

_"I know."_

_"He could be dying or going crazy or I don't even know what else!"_

_"I know!" _Altair shouts back, finally losing the struggle to stay calm. If anything, he was more worried than Desmond, because at least Desmond sort of trusts Shay (for some reason). Altair doesn't, and he hates the idea of leaving Connor alone with him, especially now, when he's so helpless.

Desmond is about to say something- Altair has no idea what- but before he can even form the thought, he spots Haytham not too far away. He abandons the conversation altogether, and focuses all his energies on running as fast as he can. Altair throws his own willpower into the effort, urging Desmond on as best he can. When they're in tune with each other, the way they are now, they can move more quickly than would be possible alone.

"Haytham," Desmond gasps, when they finally arrive in front of him. "We found him."

"Connor?"

Desmond nods, still struggling to breathe normally enough to talk. "I'll take you to him," he says, and turns back toward where they'd left Connor. Before he can really move, though, Haytham grabs him by the arm.

"Wait," he says. "How is he?"

"Bad," Desmond says, without elaboration, and Haytham doesn't say anything else as they take off running again.

**-/-**

**I'm so unhappy with this chapter, you don't even know. I rewrote it like three and a half times and while I guess this is sort of okay, it's still kind of not okay so I don't even know. At this point I'm just going to set it free and see how it does in the wild.**


	19. Chapter 19

Connor breathes shallowly because moving any more than that is painful beyond what he's ever thought possible. In the aftermath of his earlier convulsions, every joint burns like it's been set on fire, and his vision is cloudy and dim. He whimpers, far past the point of caring how pathetic and weak he sounds.

Someone moves above him, and Connor squints against his fading vision. He recognizes Shay first, and then the glint of a weapon against the sunlight. His breath catches in his throat, and he wonders if this is the end. Something painful and tight is squeezing like a vise around his chest, and it takes Connor a minute or so to realize it's not his imagination, or his own fear.

Something is trying to get out.

As soon as he realizes this, his chest bursts open. Not literally- his skin is undamaged and whole, but it feels like he's been ripped in two, and something huge and see through surges from the hole Connor can _feel_, even if he knows it isn't there. And then the something solidifies, and Connor is looking into the face of the most enormous, hairiest, angriest bear he's ever seen. It roars and forces itself onto its hind legs, ready to come down on Connor hard enough to crush him.

Time seems to slow as Connor struggles to move away from the beast, but he's too weak to manage it. Every limb trembles when he tries to put weight on it, and he's panting for breath before he can go half a foot. He stops, and stares up at the bear again, first in fear, and then in a kind of horrified recognition. This is the bear that was inside him, the one whose power's he'd gained from drinking the tea. And now it's gone, but it looks like Connor isn't going to get more than a few seconds to enjoy its leaving.

And then Shay comes out of nowhere, taunting the bear, stabbing at it with quick little motions that annoy the bear more than hurt it. The bear changes direction and comes down on top of Shay instead of Connor, but the man ducks out of the way at the last possible second, digging a blade through the thick fur of its neck as it roars again. Connor closes his eyes, both unable and unwilling to watch the fight. After a very long time, there's a thud and Shay shouts in triumph.

The bear is dead, but Connor doesn't feel better. A little, maybe, but the pressure in his chest refuses to let up. It keeps tightening, and this time Connor isn't at all surprised to see a second animal break away from him. It's the eagle this time, and Shay curses before pulling out a pistol and firing- once, twice. The first bullet misses the bird's wildly swooping form, but the second goes straight through its wing. The bird keens loudly and falls- Shay is waiting on the ground to push a hidden blade through its chest.

He looks over at Connor, wiping sweat away from his forehead and breathing heavily. "How's it going?" he asks.

"Worst… cure… ever," Connor chokes out. With two animals gone, the pain has begun to fade, and he manages to haul himself off the ground so he's sitting instead of sprawled helplessly on the grass. His vision is a little clearer, and he shakes his head impatiently to speed the process. "One more."

And as if his words are a signal, the expected pain grows and then spikes inside him, and the wolf comes bounding out, spinning around to face Connor with its ears pulled flat against its head and teeth bared. Shay moves forward, sword drawn, but Connor holds up a hand. "No!" he blurts. "Stop, wait!"

Shay actually does stop, clearly confused, but doesn't lower his blade. "Why?" he asks. "What happened?"

"Nothing," Connor says. "Nothing, just… don't kill it."

He can't exactly explain why he doesn't want Shay to kill the wolf, only that it wouldn't feel right. It's been a constant presence in his mind for months now, not always welcome but always, always present. "Go on," he mumbles, prodding weakly at the wolf- it droops a little, dropping its aggressive stance so that it looks confused and almost hurt. "Get out of here."

The wolf pads away from them on silent feet, and then stops and glances back like it's expecting Connor to call it back. He doesn't. Instead, he shakes his head, and speaks with more conviction than he's been able to manage until now. "I don't need you anymore," he says. "You're free. We both are."

And the wolf almost seems to smile at him before throwing back its head and howling into the cloudless sky above. There is an answering howl from somewhere just out of sight, and the wolf bounds toward it at top speed, every muscle in its body radiating joy at finally being free- because although Connor has been a prisoner in his own mind all these months, trapped by the presence of so many spirits in his mind and body, the wolf has been in just the same situation. He can't begrudge it this freedom now. It is the first and oldest of the animals in his head, and while Connor has never felt much connection to either the eagle or the bear (faceless and half real in his mind, empty of real personality or desires), the wolf has always had a mind of its own. It's good to see it finally have a body, too.

"You didn't have to do that," Shay says from behind him, and Connor jumps a little at the reminder that the other man is there. He sounds honestly puzzled as he goes on. "Why would you spare its life?"

"It felt right," Connor says. "And you didn't have to listen when said stop."

"It's your choice," Shay says. "Not mine."

Connor hears quick footsteps coming from the opposite direction from the one where the wolf had disappeared. He twists around, still struggling not to collapse, and beams when he sees his father. The smile hurts his face, but he can't stop. Not now, not when he's finally free.

"Dad," he says, and Haytham barely hesitates before leaning down for the most awkward embrace Connor has ever been a part of. Even though it's weird and a little uncomfortable, he clings to Haytham anyway, and feels for a minute like a small child again. His mother used to hold him like this sometimes, when he'd hurt himself playing, or when he'd come crying to her during storms back when such things were still enough to scare him. But his father? Never.

He clings more tightly, not at all ready to let go.


	20. Chapter 20

Between the two of them, Haytham and Shay manage to carry Connor up to the house. He feels lighter than he should, like losing the animals that share his body has stolen something more. Energy or life or something else he doesn't understand- there are ribs visible through his skin, and Haytham makes an effort to move him more gently.

"I'm fine," Connor says when they're nearly back at the house. He pushes away from the two men supporting him, but there's no strength left in him and Haytham scoffs and keeps his hold. Shay, on the other hand, lets go and steps back like he can't wait to get away from all this. Haytham takes pity on his obvious discomfort at being back in the place where he'd lost so much.

"You don't have to stay," he says. His own voice sounds strange in his ears, terse and commanding the way it used to be before a group of assassins came into his head and changed his life forever- when he'd been grandmaster of the templars, not the father of an assassin. Connor hears the shift as well, flinching away as if in pain.

Shay nods. "I think this is… I mean, I don't want to intrude," he says, and when Haytham nods he slips away without another word.

"Desmond," Haytham says. He's been trailing the other three with a distracted expression on his face (probably talking to whomever happens to be in his head at the moment), but he jumps when Haytham addresses him.

"Yea?"

"Why can Shay see you?"

"I went undercover at Abstergo to try and figure out what happened to the apples," Desmond explains. "They stuck me in an animus looking at Shay's memories. He found some piece of Eden, and now I'm in his head."

"In Lisbon?" Haytham asks, and Desmond nods. "So you understand why he did… what he did." He's not entirely sure why it's important, except that Shay isn't (always) as harsh as he seems. Mostly he's just sad and guilty and running as fast as he can from a past he may never escape. He doesn't need to take any criticisms from Desmond.

"Some of it," Desmond says slowly. "But he's… difficult."

"Yes," Haytham says. "That's exactly the right word."

"Hard to understand."

"Who are you talking to?" Connor interrupts, and Haytham glances between him and Desmond.

"He can't see me," Desmond says, looking even more upset. "I need to get back in his head before he'll be able to."

Connor's eyes search the space around where Desmond is standing, and then he holds out a hand as if to touch him. Both Haytham and Desmond stop, waiting to see what will happen- but nothing does. Connor's hand passes right through Desmond as if he were a ghost, and Desmond shudders.

"That feels so weird," he says. "Tell him I'll get back in his head as soon as I can."

Haytham repeats this, then glances back at Desmond. "You know how to do that?"

Desmond nods, and Haytham breathes out a sigh of relief. He's looking forward to having everyone back in his head, even with the addition of Shay to stir things up. And to think he'd been so reluctant to let any of them in, at first.

"Connor!"

Mary's shout pulls Haytham out of his distracted thoughts, and a moment later she's standing in front of them, Ziio following only half a step behind. Mary stops, clearly uncertain what to do next. Ziio has no such qualms, sweeping Connor into her arms and checking every inch of him for damage. They speak in quick, hurried words in their own tongue, Ziio probing with questions and Connor answering. Mary glances over at Haytham, eyebrows raised, and he only shrugs.

"He's okay though, right?" Mary asks.

"Fine," Haytham says. "Back to normal."

"Or as close as he gets," Desmond adds. Haytham tries very hard to keep his face still, because he's not in the mood to explain to Mary why he's getting annoyed at someone she can't see. Connor is normal _enough_, and certainly no stranger than the rest of them.

Ziio and Mary take over in in guiding Connor back to the house. He protests every step of the way, looking back at Haytham with a clear _help me _expression on his face. Haytham only shrugs- he's not getting in the way of those two women. Doing so would be both stupid and suicidal, and Haytham prides himself on being neither. Besides, he needs the chance to talk to Desmond alone.

"Desmond," he says, without looking away from the group heading away from them. "I've known Shay for a very long time."

"Yea," Desmond says. "And?"

"Some of the things he did- _we _did- you're not going to like them. But they did happened, because I remember them happening."

"So you're saying it's too late to change anything?" Desmond asks.

"Yes," Haytham says firmly. Desmond nods thoughtfully, then pulls an exasperated face. "Something wrong with that?"

"No," Desmond sighs. "Sorry. I pretty much agree with you, but Altair's being stubborn."

And now Haytham does look straight at Desmond, knowing Altair will see him through Desmond's eyes, and addresses the ancient assassin.

"Nothing Shay has done as a templar is any worse than what you've done as an assassin. You don't have to like him, but if he's going to be in our heads for the foreseeable future, you do have to get along with him. If nothing else, keep in mind that he just saved Connor's life." And since he can't see Altair's reaction, he doesn't know what he's thinking or feeling. All he has to work with is Desmond's slightly terrified expression of _how did I get stuck in the middle of this_, and that's no help at all. "Just think about it," he says, and goes to check on Connor.

**-/-**

**I'm gonna do something I don't really like doing, which is responding to reviews in the author notes. But an anon pointed out that we haven't heard from Ezio in a while, and yes, that's true. It's on purpose for two reasons- O_ne_, Ezio is really difficult for me to write, and I'm lazy. _Two, _secret plot shennanigans. That will come up eventually, when Ezio finally shows in... five to six chapters, maybe? Or I might chicken out of the Ezio plan because MAN it is not a happy plan. **


	21. Chapter 21

After the less than comfortable conversation with Haytham, Altair goes quiet and thoughtful in the back of Desmond's mind. Desmond lets him do it, doesn't pry into what he's thinking or why, just logs out of the animus and goes quietly back to the floor he's supposed to be on. By the time he's back at his own desk, Altair is gone (returned to his own time, presumably), leaving Desmond alone to deal with whatever come next with Shay.

"Hey, numbskull!"

Desmond slaps on a docile face, and thinks about how badly he'd like to punch Violet in the face as he turns to look at her.

"What."

"Wow," she says. "Grumpy much?" Desmond says nothing, so she scoffs and goes on. "Just wanted to tell you there's a little glitch in the memory sequence you're working with. Not your fault, this time, so that's good for you. And it's really nothing to worry about, barely even worth mentioning. But the next memory is going to be just a little bit farther along in Shay's life."

"How far, exactly?" Desmond asks. He's suspicious of this sudden glitch, the timing is just too convenient. Five minutes ago he was in Shay's future, and now suddenly there's a glitch showing who-knows-what. It would be exactly Desmond's kind of luck if he gets into the memory and sees Connor and Haytham and maybe even himself…

His mind races and he starts thinking of excuses for why he can't get into the animus right now, but Violet surprises him by physically grabbing him and forcing him down and into his seat. "Come on," she says. "I don't have all day, and this is what we pay you for. Get a move on."

Technically, every piece of information Desmond had provided Abstergo when he came in undercover had been false, so his pay was going into an account he will never be stupid enough to actually touch. But there's no use arguing, not when Violet's literally standing right behind him. So Desmond heaves a sigh ("Stop being so dramatic, numbskull") and logs into the animus.

Immediately, he realizes something is wrong. This is not a little glitch, this is the entire world coming apart at the seams. Desmond's brain feels like a television tuned to a bad channel, all hissing static chewing at his brain. He's in Shay's mind, and as that seems like the only solid thing in the world, Desmond clings to him with something like desperation. Nothing is fully loaded, and everything is sort of surreal, half there and half not.

_"Desmond!" _Shay says, and this is not the same man Desmond had just seen through Haytham's mind. This is Shay from the same point in his life as he had been when Desmond last left the animus, a newly minted templar brought forward in his own timeline thanks to a combination of animus glitch and his connection to Desmond. _"What's going on?"_

Except that Desmond doesn't know what this is, either, because if it's just a glitch in the animus, Shay shouldn't be aware there's anything wrong (should he?). It looks strange to Desmond because this is a memory he hasn't synced with yet, but this is Shay's own memory. It's probably just the artifact, but still…

_"Desmond!"_

He shakes himself out of his distraction because Shay sounds like he's struggling to keep himself from panicking. At least Desmond is familiar with the animus- Shay, obviously, is not. So Desmond says _"Listen" _and Shay does. He quiets, and waits for Desmond to make sense of all this. Later, Desmond will remember this moment as the one when he stops caring if Shay is an assassin or a templar. From this point on, Shay becomes just like the rest of them.

They're all stuck with each other, inseparably bound together in the most personal way possible. And nothing can keep them apart for long- Desmond has risked almost everything to get his ancestors back when the apples were drained. They'd rescued him from the apple when there was no reason to think he was even alive. Together, they'd stumbled their way through learning the apples and time travel. They have given everything to the others, and there's no excuse for doing anything les with Shay, regardless of his loyalties. Besides, he had (he will?) save Connor's life, and that's got to be worth a little bit of trust. This is just (yet another) confusing twist to figure out and deal with, and they will do exactly that.

_"Okay," _he says. _"Here's how it is. I'm using a machine called an animus to see your memories."_

_"I know," _Shay snaps. _"We've been over this."_

_"Well it's…." _Desmond flails mentally, struggling to find a way to explain computer glitches. _"Broken. Just a little."_

_"So?"_

_"So it skipped ahead," _Desmond explains. _"And because of that artifact from Lisbon-"_ And Shay doesn't move at all but in his mind he flinches away from Desmond like he's been struck (And Desmond thinks _wow this guy needs therapy_). _"Because of that," _he goes on, _"I guess it skipped for you instead of just for me."_

_"Lucky me," _Shay says, still obviously upset. _"I have to see my own life out of order."_

_"I thought you make your own luck?"_

_"…shut up," _Shay says, but he sounds more cheerful, weirdly enough. _"So what am I doing here?"_

_"Your guess is as good as mine," _Desmond says. _"Where is this, anyway?"_

_"Paris," _Shay says with absolute certainty. _"I came here once when I was younger. There were these girls-"_

_"I don't even want to know," _Desmond says hastily, before Shay can really get going. He looks around, spots something in the distance, and points it out to Shay. There's not much actually loaded in this memory, so they run after the only thing that seems worth investigating. And in the end, it doesn't take long to get past the out of place memory (although they never exactly figure out how they got to France in the first place). When it's over, Shay's memories pick up smoothly where Desmond had left off at the end of his last animus session, and on the outside it looks like nothing has changed. Only Desmond and Shay recognize the difference, because no one else can tell that now they're really working together, the way Desmond is used to with his ancestors. And it feels great.

Later, when Desmond logs out of the animus for the day, he finds Altair in his head again.

_"So about Shay," _he says. _"I was thinking-"_

_"I know," _Altair says, grudgingly. And there's no more discussion after that. They just accept Shay as he is, and things start to go much more smoothly.

**-/-**

**I've been debating how I should do the incomplete memories for ages and finally I figured I'd just throw words at the page and see what sticks**


	22. Chapter 22

The next morning, when Desmond wakes, he finds himself already apparently up and busy, flipping through the employee manual in his communicator. He stares dumbly for several seconds as he tries to process how exactly this is supposed to be possible, then realizes abruptly that he is not alone in his mind.

_"Shay!"_

_"What?"_

He sounds so calm that for a second Desmond can't even answer. This is just… it's _wrong_, on every conceivable level, and here's Shay acting like it's no big deal.

_"What, Desmond?" _he asks again, and this time Desmond manages to gather himself together enough to answer.

_"This is _my_ body," _he says.

_"I noticed," _Shay says. _"And?"_

_"And why are you moving it around?" _Desmond demands. _"I was asleep!"_

_"And I was bored," _Shay says, like this is an excuse. He turns back to the communicator. _"Did you read this?"_

_"No," _Desmond says. _"Of course not. But that's not the issue-_

_"They recommend putting your hands in any fires you see to make sure they're real," _Shay says. _"Possibly the worst advice I've ever heard."_

_"This is not okay," _Desmond says. _"It's my body, you don't get to move it. I don't go around stealing your body, do I?"_

_"No," _Shay admits. _"But you were asleep! I didn't really think you would mind."_

Desmond's answer is to force control away from Shay- there's a brief struggle, and then Shay retreats, grumpily, to the back of their shared head. _"Don't do that," _Desmond says. _"Seriously, it's weird. I don't know what you're going to do when you're in here."_

_"I was _bored!_"_

_"Nobody else seems to have a problem," _Desmond says, and Shay's interest suddenly seems to sharpen.

_"Who else has been in your head?" _he asks. _"I thought it was just me and Altair."_

Desmond scoffs. _"I keep forgetting how behind you are on everything. Ezio, Edward, and Connor are just… gone for a while. I need to go back up to the seventeenth floor and mess with those animi to get them back, only Violet keeps kicking me out. Haytham should be around soon, though."_

He lets Shay start rooting through his memories, pointing out the more relevant memories occasionally. As Shay does this, Desmond's communicator chimes to announce the arrival of a new message, and he looks down. He's not expecting anything, but in his experience there are no good messages to get from Abstergo. When he opens the message, he sees that this one is no exception- it's a summons up to Melanie Lemay's office, phrased in such a way as to make it clear that this is not an option, and it's not something he can just blow off. He is to go straight up to her office at the first available opportunity, no excuses.

So he braces himself for the worst, makes a mental note to continue his conversation with Shay later, and goes.

"You wanted to see me?" he says when the elevator finally stops on the floor with her absolutely enormous office. He keeps his voice quiet and his head down, because he knows for a fact that this is the woman behind the sample seventeen project, and the last thing he wants is her recognizing him.

"Yes," she says. "Have a seat." Desmond does, trying to ignore how perky her voice sounds so he can at least take her seriously. It's hard, though- she just sounds so obnoxiously cheerful.

"Is something wrong?" he asks, because she's staring at him with just a hair of suspicion.

"No," she says, smiling and shaking her head a little. "You just look… very similar to someone else."

"I get that a lot," Desmond says dismissively. Inside he's praying for her to move on, and after a moment or two of consideration she shrugs and does. But the relief Desmond feels is short lived, because the next subject Melanie moves onto is not much better. Maybe, if Desmond hadn't been an assassin, or if he hadn't known exactly what happened in this building a year ago, he wouldn't have any idea what she was hinting at, but he is and he does so it's not that hard to figure out.

_"She's a templar?" _Shay asks, and Desmond very nearly scowls as Shay triggers his eagle vision and sends the world into shades of gray and blue and red.

_"Stop doing that!"_

_"Huh," _Shay says, ignoring Desmond as he studies Melanie. She's a bright blob of red at the moment. _"Is she your enemy or mine?"_

_"Mine," _Desmond says, blinking his sight back to normal. _"It's my head."_

_"Why's she telling you all this?" _Shay asks.

_"That's a really good question," _Desmond says. He doesn't like Melanie more or less coming right out and saying she's been recruited to the templar ranks. It tells him that either she doesn't care if he knows because she's going to have him killed when all this is over, or because she wants to recruit him.

As she stands to dismiss him, Desmond suddenly catches sight of one of the files on her desk. Before he can think better of it, he points. "What is that?" he asks.

"This?" Melanie glances down, a little surprised, and flips the file open. "Nothing too important, why?"

Because the name of the file is 'The Instruments of the First Will', and Desmond would give anything to see inside of that file.

"I just saw the name," Desmond says. "Somewhere. I don't remember where, it was a while ago and I wasn't really paying that much attention-"

_"You're babbling," _Shay says, and Desmond cuts himself off before he can make a total idiot of himself. "I wondered what it was."

But Melanie only shakes her head and puts the file away in one of her desk drawers- Desmond watches it like a dog following a plate of food. "Sorry," she says. "It's a little above your pay grade."

Before she'd closed the file, Desmond had noticed the templar insignia on one of the pages, so he knows what she means is she's only going to show it to a templar. "That's okay," Desmond says. "I… shouldn't have asked."

He turns to leave, but suddenly stops as he loses control over his own body. _"Shay," _he says warningly. _"Shay, whatever you're doing, don't you dare do it-"_

"I did have another question, actually," Shay says through Desmond's mouth. There's a trace of his own accent in the words, but not enough to be noticeable to anyone not looking for it. Other than that, he manages a very good impersonation.

"Yes?"

"You were in charge of the sample seventeen project, right?" Shay asks, completely ignoring Desmond's continued mental protests. For some reason he's excited, and that's keeping Desmond from forcing control back. When Melanie nods, clearly curious where this is going (something Desmond would _very much _like to know too), Shay goes on, lying smoothly. "I've been having problems with some of the memories I'm working on, and I heard that one was really successful." Melanie smiles at the obvious flattery. "So I thought I'd go up and look at some of the files, but Violet keeps kicking me out-"

"You should have clearance to go up there," Melanie says, tapping away at her communicator. "I'll send her a message and tell her you have my permission."

"Thanks," Shay says, and Desmond is shocked enough at this outcome that he lets the other man walk them out of Melanie's office and into the elevator.

_"What were you doing?" _he demands when he finally gets past the surprise. _"We literally just talked about this! My body. Not yours."_

_"Oh come on," _Shay says, hitting the button for the seventeenth floor and surrendering control back to Desmond. _"Isn't this what you wanted?"_

_"You're just lucky she didn't fire you. Or me. Or whatever."_

He regrets the words as soon as he says them, and rolls his eyes preemptively. _"I know, I know, you-"_

_"Make my own luck," _Shay says with way too much satisfaction.

The elevator doors open and Desmond heads out, groaning mentally at Shay's smug gloat. _"You know, just because it worked out okay doesn't make this alright."_

_"Does that mean 'thank you'?" _Shay asks.

_"Yea," _Desmond admits. _"Yea, I guess it does."_

**-/-**

**I've decided Shay has absolutely no concern for personal space. Or privacy or whatever.**


	23. Chapter 23

The first time Edward meets Shay, he's changing a diaper full of some of the foulest smelling gunk he's ever seen while Jenny makes exaggeratedly disgusted noises from the other side of the room. It's been an absurdly long day. Haytham is teething, Jenny is being (oh God) a teenager, and all of a sudden there's a stranger in his head. He stops what he's doing, passes off the diaper to Jenny (she protests loudly but finally walks out of the room, holding it at arm's length to throw it in with the other dirtied diapers). When he's finally alone, apart from Haytham who is five months old and couldn't possibly care less what his father does, Edward shuts his eyes to close out any distractions from the real world and focuses on his unexpected visitor.

_"So you would be…" _there's a jarring but almost reassuringly familiar feeling of someone rifling through his memories before the stranger goes on. _"…Edward."_

_"And who are you supposed to be?" _Edward demands.

_"This is Shay," _a second voice says, and Edward starts as he realizes there's not one but two people taking up space in his head. He's gotten pretty used to sharing but he's never even considered having two visitors at once, which is probably why he assumed there was only one person now. But this second voice is one he recognizes.

_"Desmond?"_

_"Hey, Edward," _Desmond says, obviously grinning. _"How's things?"_

_"Oh, you know-" _Haytham decides he's had enough of lying around without pants and starts screaming. Edward winces and goes looking for a fresh diaper. _"Loud. Loud and smelly, mostly. What are you doing here? Who's the new kid? How-"_

_"It's a long story," _Desmond interrupts. _"I'll catch you up later but Shay's okay."_

_"Just okay?"_

_"Shush."_

Edward can't stop smiling. With Desmond and Shay's argument running in the back of his head like some kind of weird commentary, the world feels like a different place. It's subtle, but _definitely_ different.

_"So what happened?" _he asks, finally finishing with the diaper and reviews his handiwork with a critical eye. It's not the best thing he's ever seen, but it looks like it will do the job, and at least Haytham has finally stopped crying. He laughs (and God, Edward loves that laugh), babbling to himself in some made up language of his own.

Desmond launches into an explanation of everything that's happened in the last few days. It's been months for Edward, but it's not like time has ever been strictly consistent between different centuries. _"So you still need to get Connor back," _he summarizes when Desmond finishes. _"And you haven't seen Ezio in ages?"_

_"Sounds right," _Desmond says. _"But I'm working on fixing that."_

_"Good," _Edward says eagerly. He's looking forward to getting back into the thick of things. While he really does like his life here, he's going a little stir crazy from being trapped in the same place all the time. It's been months since he's even seen anything interesting. _"Do you-"_

Haytham lets out a squeal of startled excitement, and Edward looks up to see that he's managed to flip himself from his back to his stomach. He grins up at his father with a look that obviously means 'look what I did!' and for a second all three people in Edward's head watch him in absolute silence.

Then Shay gives a snort of laughter. _"Oh my God," _he says. _"This is the most adorable baby I've ever seen." _

_"So we're all agreed that we're never letting him live this down, right?" _Edward asked cheerfully, already looking forward to his next encounter with the older version of his son.

_"Absolutely," _Desmond said, and Shay only laughed.

**-/-**

**Short chapter because the next three chapters are going to be just bringing back Edward/Connor/Ezio like bam bam bam and I don't think anyone wants to sit and read three versions of 'this is what happened blah blah let's get caught up'. So this chapter is short, Connor's will probably be short, and Ezio's... hmm. Ezio. :)**

**Also I hope everyone is ready for more baby Haytham in future chapters because why not.**


	24. Chapter 24

It takes almost a week before Connor is well enough to leave his room and eat in the kitchen with the others. He's sick of being bedridden, and very eager to start gaining weight back so he can leave the house. The worst of it all is the aggressive way his mother and Mary take to his caretaking. Looking to his father is no help at all, because Haytham is far too intelligent to get in their way.

Still, once he can get downstairs on his own and feed himself, they back off a little. He's intent on the food (it's been a long time since he's really eaten well) when he hears a slight noise from the other side of the table and looks up. And smiles.

"You're back," he says, and Desmond nods. He's not the only one, either- Shay (looking much younger than the one Connor had met earlier) is standing a little way behind him, looking uncomfortable and out of place, and Edward is sitting next to him, looking cheerful as ever. "Where's Altair? I thought you had him back already."

"He's around somewhere," Desmond says dismissively. "Back in his own time, I guess? He'll show up eventually."

And as if their conversation is enough to pull him to them across the centuries and toward them, Altair steps suddenly out of thin air to join the group. His eyes dart from person to person, taking in the entire group, then he nods (like _yes, all is right with the world_) and sits down next to Edward, who slaps him companionably on the back. "Welcome back," he says.

"You smell terrible," Altair tells him.

There are footsteps at the door, and all five of them turn around to find Haytham standing there, looking at the assembled group with one eyebrow raised and the faintest of smiles on his face.

"It's his fault," Edward says, pointing at Haytham.

"Excuse me?" Haytham says. "I just got here, I'm fairly sure that means whatever it is, it's not my fault."

"No, it definitely was," Shay says, and there's a wicked grin on his face that makes Desmond give an unattractive snort of laughter.

"What-" Connor turns from one to the other, feeling like he's missing the joke. "I don't get it."

"I was changing diapers," Edward explains, and Connor feels his mouth drop into a little 'oh' of surprise as he puts the pieces together. He knows that Edward is his father's father, but for some reason he's never put the pieces together and figured out that it means Edward must have been there when Haytham was a baby.

"What kind of kid was he?" Connor asks, and his father turns a glare on him that once upon a time (before everything that's happened, before they mostly became mostly friends) would have made him angry. Now it makes him smile.

"So incredibly bossy," Edward says. "He's always waking me up in the middle of the night because he's hungry, or he's pooped his pants, or he feels like crying…" he shakes his head in mock seriousness, and sure enough Connor can see dark shadows under the man's eyes. "Plus he's teething right now, so _that's_ incredibly fun."

Desmond breaks out into sudden and uncontrollable laughter, burying his face in his hands as his shoulders shake with silent mirth.

"Come on," Haytham says, clearly annoyed. "It can't have been that funny."

"It really was," Shay says, struggling not to laugh himself.

"No," Edward sighed. "I have to agree with Haytham." He looked over at Connor and shook his head sadly. "The things that come out of your father's ass-"

"Okay!" Haytham says loudly, as half the table erupts into laughter. "And I think that's quite enough of that. Shouldn't we be getting Ezio, or something?"

"Oh yea," Desmond says. "Absolutely."

"Good."

"He'd _love _this story."

Haytham glares in response. "I hate you all," he says. "I hope you know that."

"Of course," Edward says indulgently. Connor smiles as the room around him fills up with conversation, cheerful arguments and half serious threats. Most of the time having this many people around would be stressful and unpleasant, but with these _particular_ people, he doesn't mind at all.


	25. Chapter 25

Desmond slips away quietly while the others talk and shout and tease one another. It's good to see everyone together again, but there's still something- someone- missing, and Desmond knows nothing will be quite right until Ezio is back with them. If they really are a family- and somehow that is exactly what they've become- then Ezio is an important piece of that.

But the others seem perfectly happy catching up, and Desmond knows that sooner or later, whatever strange technology drives the pieces of Eden will send them back to their respective times. So at least that's one thing he doesn't have to worry about. He's still smiling faintly with the memory of the reunion when he logs out of Connor's memories the animus and selects the last remaining file on the computer in front of him.

By now, the process of resynching with an ancestor is perfectly familiar to Desmond. He breathes in, deeply, as Ezio's memories rush into and over and through him, filling him up and making him something more than just himself.

Except this time, something is wrong. And Desmond doesn't know exactly what that something is.

When he finally lands inside Ezio's mind, it doesn't feel the way it should. His mind is disjointed and his thoughts scattered like a cloud on the wind. Desmond feels a sharp spike of panic jolt through him, and he gets frantically to work, gathering the drifting pieces of Ezio's mind back together.

After a few moments of effort (moments that feel like they take an eternity), Ezio takes a wheezing, shuddering breath. Desmond can feel a sickness there, and it hits him for the first time just how _old _Ezio has grown. He knows Ezio is old, of course, older than the rest of them, but he's always been so cheerful and upbeat, in all but the very worst of situations. Somehow he's never actually realized how many years the man has already put behind him.

_"…Desmond," _Ezio says, seeming to notice his presence at last.

_"Yea," _Desmond says. _"Ezio, what's wrong? What-" _He can feel his ancestor starting to drift away again, and scrambles to keep his mind together. But it's like trying to hold fog in his bare hands, and no matter what he does or how hard he tries, he can't stop bits and pieces of Ezio's mind from floating away.

_"You came just in time," _Ezio says, and even within his own mind, his voice sounds weak and quiet. Far away.

_"Just in time for what?" _Desmond demands. _"Ezio, seriously, you're _scaring _me."_

_"I am dying," _Ezio says simply, and even though he half knows it already, the words still hit Desmond so hard he feels like he's been punched in the face.

_"No," _he says. All trace of his earlier happiness from reuniting with Edward and Connor is gone as he finds himself unexpectedly pleading for Ezio's life. _"No! Ezio, please. You can't, not right now. Everyone else is waiting for you. There's this new guy, Shay. You'll like him, I think, a lot. The two of you can drive everyone else crazy."_

He can feel Ezio's regret, something deep and thorough, a sadness that goes beyond Desmond's ability to describe in words. _"Don't do this," _Ezio says. _"Desmond, please. It's my time, and this is not such a bad way to go. I want to pass on peacefully, and I cannot do that with you crying and clutching at my mind like an infant."_

Desmond is not crying, but if he'd had his own body at that moment he knows he would have been. He'd come here to bring Ezio home, to bring him back to see the others again. And instead, he finds Ezio on death's door, and he is faced suddenly with the horrifying prospect of saying goodbye to one of his ancestors. For good, this time- he himself had come back when everyone thought him dead, but he senses instinctively that this is different. Ezio is truly dying, and he is enough at peace with himself to do so with no regrets The only thing keeping him from going peacefully is Desmond's panic.

_"I'm not a child," _he tells Ezio. _"But you can't just leave! We still need you. _I _still need you."_

_"No," _Ezio says. _"You are strong, Desmond. You can get through your life without me." _Desmond feels tears start to form on Ezio's face, and thinks they might be his. As he struggles to get himself under control, Ezio continues speaking. _"You have been here in my mind since the moment I was born," _he says. _"And I would not have lived past that hour had you not been there. You have saved me more times than I can count. You were there when I thought there was no point to going on, and you showed me the world is so much bigger and wider than I ever thought. You and Altair are the two closest friends I have ever had, and the Kenways- they weren't all bad, either. So I want to say thank you, Desmond."_

_"Ezio-"_

_"But I need you to do one more thing," _Ezio says. _"I need you to let me go."_

_"I can't!" _Desmond says, and the only reason he can speak at all is that he has no body at the moment. Otherwise, he knows he would have been choking on his own tears. _"Please, I can't-"_

_"Desmond-" _Ezio sounds fond and exasperated, but also distant. It is a real effort to hear his voice now, and there is so little of him left in his own mind that Desmond can't even try to keep it all together. It floats, untethered and almost free. _"We have been in one another's minds. We have _been_ one another, on occasion. There's no way I can ever be gone for good, not while you and the others remember me the way I know you will. But you really have no choice in the matter."_

_"Why not?" _Desmond demands. _"I'm sure I can think of something, just hold on a little bit longer-"_

_"No," _Ezio says. _"You have no choice because it's already too late."_

And that's when Desmond realizes he can't remember the last time he felt Ezio take a breath, that his heart is still inside a chest that is rapidly growing cold. For a split second, he has a horrible kind of déjà vu, remembering his first time in Ezio's mind. He remembers pleading with silent, desperate words to an infant he doesn't even know to _breathe, just breathe!_

It had worked then, but this time he knows it will do no good. The last of Ezio drifts away, nothing but a memory in the wind and a corpse in the sun. Desmond (who has never been a religious man, but if not now then when?) mentally closes his eyes in concentration and sends a silent prayer after him. He has no eyes of his own to close, and Ezio's are wide and staring at nothing, but he needs to do this right.

_"Please, God," _he prays. _"I don't know if you're out there, or what comes next, but if there is a heaven, then this man deserves to see it."_

And then he is going as well. With nothing left in Ezio's mind, there is nothing to keep Desmond where in his empty shell of a body. He barely has time for a mental _"requiescat in pace" _before he is back in his own body and his own time.

Now the tears that go streaming down his face are undoubtedly his own. Heedless of his cover or the Abstergo security cameras that no doubt watch his every move, Desmond buries his face in his arms and sobs.

**-/-**

**I don't want to say too much because I want the chapter to speak for itself, but if I get a lot of upset reviews on it I may talk about this a little when the next one goes up.**


	26. Chapter 26

Altair notices when Desmond quietly leaves the room and disappears. When he can't find him after a few minutes, Altair assumes Desmond must have gone back to his own time, presumably to reconnect with Ezio. Sure enough, it's not a very long time after that when Altair feels Ezio slot into place in his mind. Technically, Ezio is in Desmond's mind, not Altair's, but Desmond is in _everyone's_ mind these days, the common point of connection between all of them, so Altair can feel when Ezio starts taking up room in his head. It's vague, more like a place where Ezio's mind _could _fit, if he were there.

A few minutes after that, they _all _feel it when Ezio dies. There's a kind of snapping feeling inside his head, like a rubber band pulled back so far that it breaks. It hurts _so much _that for a second Altair is left reeling from the shock of losing Ezio. The whole room goes totally quiet as everyone looks around at the others to see if they'd noticed, if they knew what it was, if it was too late to fix it.

"What just happened?" Shay demands, turning (for some reason) to Altair. In fact, they're all looking at him.

"I don't know," Altair snaps. Because he's missing Ezio, too. "I don't have the answers, I don't-"

"Ezio's dead," Edward says. Alone of all of them, he looks more angry than shocked. Then again, Altair has seen enough of Edward's life to know hitting and yelling at things is how he handles the unexpected- he'd spent his younger years as a pirate, and hitting things is a pretty effective strategy in most situations.

"Who?" Shay asks. He looks utterly confused by all this, and Altair can't blame him. The poor man's never even met Ezio, but here he is with something suddenly broken inside his head.

"Ezio," Altair says quietly. "He's- he was one of us. Now he's gone."

And the worst of it is that Altair can still feel traces of Ezio lingering inside his head. He pictures his mind as a patchwork quilt, bits and pieces of himself and Desmond and the Kenways and Shay and yes, Ezio too, But Ezio's pieces have been torn away, there are holes in his mind where his _friend _should be. That would be bad enough on its own, but Ezio hasn't been torn away neatly. The threads where he should be connected to Altair's mind are still there, little painful reminders of where Ezio should be, but isn't.

He might have stayed lost in his own thoughts indefinitely, except that suddenly Desmond is there, falling out of the future, red eyed and choking on sobs. Shay, who happens to be the closest, jumps to his feet and reaches out to steady him. Desmond clings to the touch, eyes vacant and chillingly empty as he hangs onto Shay like the man is the only thing tying him to solid ground. Altair can't really blame him for the reaction- by the shell shocked look on Desmond's face, Altair assumes he'd been there when Ezio died.

Without saying a word, he moves forward to rest his hand on Desmond's shoulder, squeezing slightly and waiting for his descendant to explain. He's not expecting any of the others to copy him, but suddenly they're all on their feet. Chairs scrape against the floor and quiet footsteps converge around Desmond. Hands reach out, one on an elbow, another on his head. Connor, swaying slightly from these few steps, is more leaning against Desmond than anything else.

He seems to take some kind of strength from them all standing around him, a wall blocking out everything and everyone else, and finally he takes a deep, shuddering breath and starts to speak. His story isn't exactly surprising. They already know Ezio is dead without Desmond telling them, and even the details are mostly things they could have guessed without him. But hearing him describe it in his own words is helpful, somehow. They know the worst, at least.

"He went peacefully," Altair says at last. "That's good. It's the least he deserved."

"I can still feel him," Haytham says. "Just a little."

Desmond nods. "He said he wouldn't be totally gone while we're still around to remember him," he says.

"Good," Altair says. "Let's keep remembering him."

"So what happens now?" Edward asks.

"I don't know," Desmond admits. "I went into Abstergo to find out what happened to you guys, and instead I got you all back." He manages to crack a small smile, and jerks a thumb at Shay. "Except we traded Ezio for this loser."

"Hey!" Shay protests.

"Too soon," Edward tells him, shaking his head.

"It's been a couple hundred years," Desmond says. "Technically."

"Oh come on!"

"And Ezio would be disappointed if we gave up just because he's gone," Connor says. There are nods all around, and slowly the group breaks up. Altair finds himself drifting toward Desmond, and they withdraw to have a slightly more private conversation.

"I always hated it when someone says stuff like that," Desmond whispers. There's no real reason to be quiet, but no one in the room is speaking aloud. It feels like a wake, despite the absence of any body. "Ezio doesn't get to complain about what we do or say about being dead. If he'd stuck around, he'd get a say, but…" Altair waits patiently. "He wanted to go! I couldn't stop him, and he just… one second he was there and then he was gone. Why would he leave?"

"Why does anyone leave anywhere?" Altair asks. "We have places to go, things to do. Maybe we want to see what's outside. Ezio was just… ready to see what would happen."

Desmond seems to think this over, then he nods and manages a smile that actually looks sincere. "It's just weird," he says. "Two years ago, I was in an animus watching him be born. And now he's dead, and it doesn't feel like enough time. Like…" he struggles with the words, and Altair waits patiently. He has seen a lot more death than Desmond has, and while Ezio's death hurts him as well, Desmond is clearly trying to figure out how to react. "He was just this little baby that couldn't even breathe on his own. Now he's…"

"I know," Altair says.

**-/-**

**LONG A/N coming up. Sorry. But I did say I would explain why Ezio died if I got a bunch of angry reviews and I got eleven (technically not all of them were angry but there was still a good amount) so here goes.**

**To start with: this is something I've been wanting to do for a very long time. Ezio doesn't live a particularly long time after the end of Revelations, and every time I forced him into another complicated adventure instead of letting him enjoy his retirement I felt like I was going against his character. But I didn't kill him then because there was never a good opportunity.**

**This time, with Ezio disappearing for over twenty chapters, it seemed like a good chance to let him die. It just doesn't make sense for him to keep going at this point (so to the person that asked if I would have killed someone else if they happened to come back last- no. Ezio was last specifically because I wanted this to happen). **

**Other contributing factors:**

**-I don't really like writing Ezio (he's super difficult)  
>-People started leaving reviews asking if he'd died of old age, so I figured it wasn't that unreasonable<br>-There are now six POV characters. With Ezio there were seven, and when Arno showed up there would have been eight. That's way too many**

**So I really am sorry if you guys were upset by him dying. I was aiming for 'bittersweet sad' but judging by the amount of 'confused and mad' I saw in reviews, I sort of missed the mark. **


	27. Chapter 27

They sit down and have a serious conversation about what to do next. Shay stays mostly quiet throughout, choosing to watch and listen instead of participate. Partially, this is because he doesn't feel completely comfortable here. The homestead looks different from what he's seen in his own life, but it's close enough to bother him. Everywhere Shay looks there are memories jumping out at him, some good and some bad, but all tarnished by the way he'd left the assassins.

The others obviously have a history together. Shay already knows that, of course, he's been told as much. But it's not the same as actually seeing it for himself. He watches the way they interact, the casual way they move and lean across each other to make a point more clearly. And he listens to the way they talk, seeming to know what the others will say before they say it. At first, it's intimidating. Like it or not, Shay is the new guy. He's not _quite _one of them yet.

And he never will be, Shay realizes, not if he stays silent and continues to say nothing. By the time he decides this, the others have just about decided that Desmond should get out of Abstergo as soon as possible. Once he's back with the assassins, they can regroup and come up with a long term plan.

"No," Shay says.

Instantly, everyone refocuses on him, and Shay grins at the looks on their faces.

"Why?" Connor asks. "You want him to stay at Abstergo?"

Shay nods, switching his attention to Desmond. "Remember when we went up to Melanie Lemay's office? And she had that file-"

"About the Instruments of the First Will," Desmond says, nodding. "Yea, I remember. But so what? The whole point of finding out about them was to figure out what happened to these guys." He makes a sweeping gesture to indicate everyone else in the room. "Now we know."

"It's still good information to have," Shay says.

"Why?" Edward demands. "What would be the point of-"

"What if they do it _again_?"

Edward stops midsentence, and he's not the only one that looks horrified at the thought of that. Shay gives them a minute to digest this before going on. "Think about it," he says. "They shouldn't have been able to do this in the first place, what's stopping them from doing it again later? If we know who they are and what they want, we might be able to stop them."

"Good thinking, Shay," Haytham says with an approving nod.

"Yea," Desmond says. "Except Melanie sort of hinted she wasn't giving that file to anyone other than a templar."

"Yes," Shay says impatiently. "And she _also_ sort of hinted she's going to try recruiting you when you get through my memories."

"No," Altair says. "We're not making Desmond a templar just to get ahold of some file that might not even have the information we need."

"Did she really hint that?" Haytham asks.

"Sort of," Desmond says. "It was subtle. Ish."

"They should screen their recruits better," Haytham says, shaking his head disapprovingly.

"Really?" Altair snaps. "That's what you're taking issue with?"

"Come on," Haytham says. "It's Desmond. They really ought to know who he is. They had his dead body in their basement for almost a year, this is really sloppy recruitment. But…" Altair gives him a look that Haytham completely ignores. "I think Shay has a point."

"It's not like he'd really have be a templar," Edward adds. "He'd just get what he needs and leave."

"It's not like they'd find him," Haytham says disdainfully, and Shay has to agree. He doesn't regret leaving the assassins for the templars, but the twenty first century incarnation of the order is really making them all look bad at the moment. "You've already escaped- what, twice, Desmond?"

Desmond nods, but before he can say anything else, Altair cuts him off.

"I still don't like it," he says. "It seems like a lot of risk for probably very little reward." He turns to Connor. Up until this point, he's stayed quiet but when Altair specifically asks him, he stirs and shakes his head.

"I really think this is a bad idea," he says. "But it's not my decision, it's Desmond's."

And Shay turns- along with everyone else in the room- to turn to Desmond. "I'll do it," he says, and Shay feels an unexpected surge of triumph as the argument comes to an end. He hadn't thought being right would matter so much. "I'm already this deep, how much is a little bit more going to hurt?"

Connor groans. "There are so many ways this could go wrong."

"Don't worry," Desmond says, and to Shay his voice sounds a little too cheerful to actually be believable. "There's only hundreds of them and sev-" he stops, swallows hard. _"Six _of us. Six. We can take them all on."

"Okay," Altair says. "I'm trusting you with this one, Desmond. If you really think this is the right thing to do, this is what we do."

"I'm pretty sure," Desmond says. "Maybe about forty percent?"

"Funny," Altair says. He doesn't sound like he's actually amused, but Shay laughs.

"I think this is going to be fun," he says.

"Or confusing," Connor says. "Or probably a disaster."

"Most likely a disaster," Haytham agrees. "Still, that seems just about par for the course with this group. So do what you need to, and we'll figure out a way to deal with whatever catastrophe happens when it actually happens."

"Thanks," Desmond says. "This would be a lot harder if you guys weren't all here." He turns back to Shay. "Ready to do this?"

"Um…"

Desmond grins and nods. "It was your idea," he says. "And I don't think Melanie's going to do anything until I get through your memories, anyway. So this is as much on you as it is on me."

Shay thinks this over, decides it's fair, and nods. "Sure," he says. "Let's go make you a templar."


	28. Chapter 28

Desmond's next trip into Shay's memories shows him another glitch.

"Damnit!" Shay curses aloud, loudly enough for a flock of birds nearby to startle and take flight. "Again?"

Desmond shushes him urgently from within the man's head- although they still don't know exactly why Shay is in Paris, there's no way him swearing at the sky for no reason is going to help. _"Come on," _he says. _"Pull it together, figure out why we're here, and get through the memory so we can leave."_

_"This is ridiculous," _Shay complains as he starts looking around for any clue of what he's supposed to do next. _"Did anybody else have to do this?"_

_"No," _Desmond says. _"Everyone has their own issues, I guess."_

Shay groans aloud. "So what's so special about me?" Shay wonders aloud.

_"Probably nothing." _

_"Wow-" _To Desmond's relief, this time he remembers to speak silently. _"Thanks, Desmond."_

Desmond scoffs. _"Listen," _he says. _"I'm not here to stroke your ego."_

Shay ignores this, suddenly distracted. Desmond can feel his body go tense like a coiled spring and his eyes focus on a distant figure that glows in eagle vision. _"That looks interesting," _Shay says, and Desmond agrees.

The memory, if this can even be called a memory when it's still in Shay's future, turns out to be _fun_. Neither Shay nor Desmond have any context at all for what's happening, and somehow that makes things better than usual. Without the usual grating differences between Desmond and Shay, it's a little easier than usual for Desmond to stop resisting and just go with the memory. As much as he is starting to like Shay, he still disagrees with a lot of what he does as a templar. Removing the context of the memory means neither of them has any idea or problem with what's going on.

Especially when Shay starts cracking jokes. They're running over a rooftop after some (possibly?) bad guy when Shay says, _"I have no idea who this guy is."_

_"Yea," _Desmond agrees. _"And..?"_

_"He could be my dentist or something."_

If Desmond had been the one running after the man, the chase would have ended right there as he stops to process this. Luckily, Shay's the one with control over his own legs, and he doesn't miss a single step.

_"Excuse me?" _Desmond says. _"Why would we be chasing your dentist over the rooftops of Paris?"_

_"I don't know who this guy is," _Shay points out. _"He could be literally anyone."_

_"Sure," _Desmond says. _"I mean yea, this memory makes no sense at all but why a dentist specifically?"_

_"Clearly you have better dentists in the future," _Shay says with a voice that would have sounded dangerous if Desmond hadn't been able to _feel _him trying not to laugh. _"He deserves whatever's coming to him, trust me."_

This is when Desmond realizes he's joking, and laughs. _"Okay," _he says. _"So let's say this is your dentist. For some reason. Whatever. Where'd he learn to-" _the man leaps the distance between two buildings, tucks into a neat roll, and springs back up without losing his momentum. _"To do that?"_

_"Well clearly he's multitalented. Possibly he's an assassin or a templar in his spare time."_

_"What-"_

_"Mmm…" _Now Shay is obviously about to start laughing as well. _"No, not an assassin. I wouldn't let one near my teeth."_

_"Shay, I'm literally in your head."_

_"Yes, I know."_

_"I'm an assassin and I'm as close to your teeth as it's possible to get. I mean, your teeth _are_ my teeth."_

By this point, neither of them is taking the memory at all seriously, too distracted by their stupid argument and with giggling like small children. Shay is slow and clumsy with the effort of keeping his laughter inside his head, but Desmond can feel his sides shaking in barely controlled spasms. Desmond isn't much better, honestly, although he's safely tucked away in Shay's head, so at least he can't do any direct damage to the memory.

Finally, and against all Desmond's expectations, they get to the end of the memory. Desmond immediately logs out of the animus, and for a while he sits at his desk, listening to Shay just completely losing it inside his head.

_"You're not supposed to laugh at your own jokes," _he says. _"Especially when they're about dentists."_

_"I'm laughing at 'your teeth are my teeth'," _Shay says. _"Ha!"_

_"You have a terrible sense of humor."_

They calm slowly, and Shay finally speaks. _"I will admit," _he says. _"I had good reasons to leave the assassins when I did, but that conversation would never have happened if I'd been in another templar's head. Assassins get all the fun…"_

Desmond considers this, and decides it is probably true. _"Is that why you haven't really talked to Haytham much?"_ he asks. _"I thought the two of you would be thick as thieves, but you've barely spoken."_

_"Not… exactly," _Shay says. _"It's just strange, because the Haytham from my time is younger and different. It's hard to see them as the same person." _Desmond hums in agreement, nodding as he does so. He's seen the cruelty in the younger Haytham himself, and doesn't like him much. _"Maybe when you're done looking through my memories, and get that file you're after, I'll sit down and get to know him a little better. But everything's just too confusing right now."_

_"Fair enough," _Desmond says. They're both calm enough now that he thinks going back into the animus wouldn't be the complete disaster it would have been a few minutes ago. _"Ready to go?"_

**-/-**

**...I couldn't remember what happened in the second incomplete memory, so I just decided Desmond and Shay weren't going to be paying attention to it. So have some stupid banter instead (note to self: no more banter writing, it's terrible).**

**Next chapter: Adewale's assassination. It had to happen sometime, and I've already put it off as long as I possibly can. Now I just need to decide if he dies or gets saved somehow.**


	29. Chapter 29

Like everyone else, there are days when Haytham wakes up in Shay's head, a silent, unseen observer. Unlike everyone else, however, the difficulty of these days is compounded by the confusion of seeing his past self through Shay's eyes. Every time this happens, he catches himself trying to remember what this had all looked like the first time around.

He keeps wondering if he'd seen any hint of himself in Shay, or noticed him acting strangely. This had been the time in his life between when he'd first met Desmond (and rejected him, as completely and quickly as possible), and when he'd decided years later to ask him for help. At this point he was still having dreams of Altair and Ezio and Desmond without knowing exactly what that meant beyond the occasional sleepless night.

_"Do you ever wish you could just grab your past self and shake him until he stops being such a stubborn idiot?" _Haytham asks Shay one day, completely exasperated at the sight of himself, dark shadows under his eyes from a sleepless, nightmare filled night.

Shay laughs aloud. _"No," _he says. _"But then I don't have to see younger versions of myself all that often."_

_"Well, consider yourself lucky then," _Haytham says.

And maybe the younger Haytham feels Shay's eyes on him, because he turns abruptly and walks closer.

_"Shite," _Shay curses. _"What'd I do?"_

_"Believe it or not, I don't remember every conversation I've ever had with you," _Haytham says, and smiles as Shay sighs.

"Sleep well, sir?" he asks, voice far more polite than it had been moments ago within his own mind.

Haytham sighs. "Well enough," he says. "We have business to discuss, Shay."

_"What business?" _Shay asks.

_"You could just wait thirty seconds for him- me-" _he pauses, gathering his thoughts before continuing. _"For him to explain."_

_"Or I could ask you, because it's faster." _But Shay does repeat the question aloud anyway

"I've found another of the assassins," Haytham says, and Shay nods. "Taking him out will be a blow to the brotherhood."

"Who is it?"

Haytham has been trying to remember how exactly this conversation went the first time, and suddenly the memory comes back. _"Fuck," _he says, and feels Shay shift a little, obviously worried.

_"What's wrong?" _he asks. _"You don't swear."_

_"Adewale," _Haytham says, at the same moment as his past self answers aloud. Shay freezes, torn between trying to look normal for the younger Haytham, and focusing on his conversation with the older one in his head.

_"Your father is going to kill us, isn't he?" _he asks.

_"Absolutely," _Haytham says. _"I'd forgotten about this until just now, but yes. My father will most likely kill both of us when he finds out we killed-"_

_"Will kill."_

_"One of his closest friends."_

Haytham waits, impatient, as Shay finishes his conversation and his past self walks away- when they're alone, and only then, Haytham speaks. _"Obviously, we need to find a way around this."_

_"Yes," _Shay says, clearly relieved. _"I thought you would want him dead."_

Haytham doesn't answer. He's distracted, watching himself walk away and wondering what's wrong with him. Clearly, both versions of himself can't be in the right; either Adewale deserves to die, because he's an assassin and therefore an obstacle, or he deserves to live because he is (by all accounts) a loyal friend and a good man.

_"When did I stop thinking like a templar?" _he asks.

Shay starts to answer, then stops, clearly unsure if the question had been meant for him. It hadn't, but Haytham waits for him to say it anyway. He could use some advice right now. Any advice. _"Then here's what I think," _Shay says. _"You're still thinking like a templar. You're the same man, just less willing to kill as a first option." _And Haytham knows he's thinking of Lisbon (again) when he says, _"I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing."_

_"True enough," _Haytham says. _"I… thank you, Shay."_

_"Don't thank me yet," _Shay says. _"We still need to find a way to save him."_

But no matter how much time they spend talking about it, they can't come up with anything. Even when Desmond shows up halfway through and lends his two cents to the process, they can't get around the fact that Haytham actually remembers seeing Adewale's body, and more specifically Shay's face as he killed him.

_"You looked horrified," _Haytham tells him. _"Or… appalled is probably a better word. Like you couldn't believe what you'd done." _That face has haunted him for years, and finally knowing why Shay had been so upset doesn't help.

_"Great," _Shay says. _"I'm looking forward to this even more, now."_

_"So we're agreed?" _Desmond says. He sounds miserable. _"Adewale… he has to die?"_

_"I don't see any other choice," _Haytham says._ "Not without risking paradoxes."_

_"Who cares?" _Shay demands. _"What happens if there's a paradox, what would happen?"_

_"No idea," _Desmond says.

Haytham adds, _"We've never been stupid enough to risk it."_

_"So let's find out!" _Shay says.

Haytham takes a deep breath. _"No," _he says. _"This isn't a normal fight, Shay. We haven't risked paradoxes for some very good reasons- it could tear the timeline apart, or split us all into alternate universes, or anything else. It's not worth risking for one life, no matter whose life it might be." _He hates saying it, but someone has to. If he has to be the bad guy, at least that means no one else has to play that rule.

_"How about four lives?" _Shay asks. _"Because we're seriously all dead as soon as Edward finds out."_

_"Well, if we're lucky, he never will." _He waits a beat, because he's known Shay for many years now and has never known him to pass up a chance to point out he makes his own luck.

This time, he doesn't even seem to notice.

**-/-**

**Whew! Sorry this chapter took a while- I actually wrote chapter 30 (thinking I could use it as 29) realized I was missing a step, and wrote this one instead. The good news is that I only need to do a quick edit of 30 before putting it out, so it should be out tomorrow at the latest.**


	30. Chapter 30

Edward is delighted when his next visit to Shay's mind finds the man aboard a ship, and a fine ship at that. It's been far too long since he's stood behind the wheel, even if technically he's nothing but an invisible passenger in another man's mind, squeezed into a too small space alongside Desmond who wordlessly shifts over to make room.

_"Hey Edward," _he says.

_"Desmond." _He grins, or he would have, if he'd had a mouth of his own at the moment. _"Good to see you."_

_"Hello to you, too," _Shay grumbles.

_"Sorry," _Edward says. _"I didn't notice you there."_

_"Didn't notice- it's _my_ head!"_

Edward laughs and goes back to admiring the ship around them. _"She's nice," _he says. _"The _Morrigan, _right?"_

Shay nods, and the conversation turns quickly to talk of sails and winds and other ships, an overly technical discussion that both of them enjoy immensely but apparently bores Desmond stiff. The other man's attention wanders away from the conversation, unfocused and then suddenly sharp as he notices something.

_"Hey," _he says. _"Haytham's on his way over."_

_"And?" _Shay asks. _"He's allowed to be here."_

_"And you should maybe stop making those faces?" _Desmond suggests. _"I get that the two of you geek out about ships, but Shay, you can't keep being all excited about a conversation no one else can hear."_

Shay tries to smooth back his emotions as Haytham comes into view, but doesn't quite manage to reach equilibrium before the elder man reaches the circle of lantern light surrounding the ship's wheel. Haytham frowns and leans against the rail, watching Shay at work. "You seem unusually alert tonight," he says. "Eager for the mission?"

_"What mission?" _Edward asks. He's come into the memory late, and in some ways he's still playing catch up. Usually, this is the part where someone will jump in and explain, but for some reason both Shay and Desmond seem to be pretending not to hear him. _"What mission?" _he asks again, and this time when neither of them answer he starts to get really worried. It suddenly strikes him that they've both been oddly distant since he joined them.

"Eager to put it behind me," Shay says to Haytham. "To be honest, this puts a sour taste in my mouth. I always liked the man."

Confused as to why no one will answer his questions, Edward shuts up and focuses on the conversation around him. Hopefully Shay and Haytham will drop enough clues between them to let him figure it out on his own- he's already tried going through Shay's mind, but Desmond is (possibly on purpose) in the way, blocking access to anything helpful.

"I know," Haytham says. "But this is the path you've chosen. You can't have thought it would be easy when you picked it."

"No, sir," Shay answers. "It's just… he's a decent man."

"And none of the templars you killed while you were an assassin were decent men?" Haytham asks.

"I'm sure they were," Shay says. "And I regret causing their deaths without understanding what I was doing. But two wrongs…" he shrugs expressively rather than finish the sentence, and Haytham sighs.

"Sometimes they do," he says. "How much more harm could Adewale do if he were left alive? How many more would die?"

Desmond and Shay flinch away as one- Shay physically, Desmond within his mind- as Haytham speaks. And for good reason. Edward takes maybe three seconds to process what he's just heard and then he's shouting, he's _angry_, demanding to know why neither of them had wanted to tell him that they're going to kill one of his closest friends, one of the few people he has left in his life that isn't dead or a traitor or both. He surges forward, reaching for control, but Desmond and Shay fight him down and away before Edward can say what he wants to Haytham.

_"What are you doing?" _he demands. And then, because he might have expected this from Shay (who is a templar and a stranger, while Desmond should have _known better_) turns to the other assassin. _"Desmond," _he says. _"Why?"_

"Shay?" Haytham frowns and comes closer. "Are you alright?"

_"Because this is what happened," _Desmond says, his voice tight with sorrow, as well as the pain from where Edward has nearly crowded him out of Shay's mind. _"We've known about this for a while, but we didn't want to tell you because… well, because we knew you'd react like this. We've been talking to Haytham- the older one, not this one- and he _remembers_ Ade dying. He was there, he saw Shay kill him. This has to happen."_

"I'm fine," Shay tells Haytham, managing a half smile and pretending to be suddenly engrossed in the difficulties of navigation.

_"No," _Edward says. _"No!"_

_"Edward!"_

He can't believe they're being so damned _calm _about all this. Like there's any way this is okay, paradoxes or no. _"This is insane!"_

_"I'm sorry," _Desmond says, and he sounds like he means it, but that's not enough for Edward, not if he's going to refuse to do anything. _"None of us has a choice here." _Edward curses, more creatively than he has in years, and burrows himself deep inside Shay's head where no one can touch him. He really doesn't have a choice, and he _hates _that. Right now, all he can do is make it as clear as possible to the others that he wants nothing to do with what's going to happen.

Long minutes later, when Shay has been relieved at the wheel and settled into his bunk to sleep, Desmond speaks up. _"Edward?"_

_"Don't talk to me, Desmond," _Edward says. But he goes on anyway, because with Shay asleep maybe this will be his chance to get through to Desmond. _"Nothing you can say will make this better. You're going to kill another assassin. My friend. We just lost Ezio, how can you do this?"_

_"There's not much wiggle room," _Desmond says.

_"It's wrong," _Edward says. _"What happened to-" _he gropes for the exact wording of the creed, which he has never bothered to really memorize. He's always felt like generally knowing their meaning is enough. _"Never turn your back on the brotherhood? Isn't that exactly what you're doing?" _He feels Desmond hesitate and presses his advantage. _"And besides, you know this is wrong as well as I do. Ade doesn't deserve to die."_

_"You're right," _Desmond says. _"I do know that. But…" _for the first time, he sounds miserable and uncertain. _"I don't know what to do."_

_"Do something!" _Edward insists. _"Do anything!"_

_"I can't."_

Edward snorts, letting his disdain for that answer show clearly in his mind. _"You know," _he says. _"After Ezio died, when we were deciding what to do next, Haytham said he was going to make you a templar. I thought he was joking, but it looks like it worked, didn't it?"_

_"Come on, Edward-"_

_"Don't you 'come on Edward' me!" _he yells. _"You know this is wrong! You know it is and you're going to do it anyway!"_

He shoves at Desmond with all the force he can manage- neither of them has a body but there's not really enough room for both of them in Shay's head. Desmond fights back, apparently more out of instinct than anything else, and Shay comes awake with a shout, clutching at his head like it's about to tear in two. Edward can feel his pain, but distantly, and he doesn't much care.

He pushes, and Desmond pushes back, and suddenly Edward is falling, out of Shay's head and onto the floor of the cabin, incorporeal and invisible to everyone but Shay, but at least in his own body again.

"We tried, Edward," Shay says. He's panting through the pain of having Edward pushed out so abruptly. "We really did."

Edward just looks at him for a second, then, without any kind of warning, punches him as hard as he can in the face. "And I hope you felt that too, Desmond," he says, before turning his back and stalking to the far corner of the cabin. He can't leave of his own accord, but he doesn't have to talk to a couple of _templars, _either.


	31. Chapter 31

To continue Edward's never ending parade of horrible, undeserved bad luck, he stays tethered to Shay until the day they finally catch up to Ade. He fights the connection every step of the way, but there's only so much he can do while he's on a ship in the middle of the ocean, with no way to even touch his surroundings.

It's torture, Edward decides, it really is. He starts spending most of his time with Haytham (the young one, the one that can't yet see or hear him), because Shay keeps trying to corner him and talk. Edward doesn't want to talk, and he figures that at least Shay will look insane if he starts talking to people no one else can see. He doesn't particularly like this version of Haytham, but he's in a tight place. Besides, in a weird way he sort of reminds Edward of the toddler sized Haytham waiting for him back home. Neither of them has any idea what's going on, nor how time travel works. Right now, that's a big plus in Edward's eyes.

When they finally run Ade aground, Edward leaves the ship with Shay and Haytham. It's not that he wants to be part of this, or even be anywhere nearby. It's just that this is tragic and cruel and unfair, and Edward feels like he has a duty to be there and witness his friend's death. He hates the morbid awfulness of it all, but Ade deserves that much, at least.

He glares at Shay the entire time, and the man at least has the decency to look ashamed. He opens his mouth like he wants to say something, but then Haytham is there as well and Shay misses his chance to speak without looking crazy. Edward sticks out his tongue in a gesture that is definitely less mature in practice than in his mind, and turns his back. He's not in the mood to hear Shay speak, anyway.

It's only a few moments after that he hears a voice calling his name, and it doesn't belong to anyone he is expecting in this time. "Connor?" Edward asks. "Why are you here?" And sure enough, when he turns around his grandson is standing only a step or two away. He still looks a little under the weather, but much recovered from the last time Edward had seen him.

Connor shrugs. "I don't know," he says. "Precursor technology, I guess, that stuff never really makes sense."

"So it's just a coincidence?"

Connor furrows his brow. "What is?"

"Shay's going to kill one of my oldest friends in a few minutes," Edward says in an almost casual voice. "Haytham and Desmond are helping."

Connor's eyes go wide. "Why?" he demands. "That's terrible!"

"Something stupid about paradoxes," Edward grumbles. "I don't know exactly why they can't do anything to save him."

"Oh," Connor says. "So that must be what they were talking about."

"What who was talking about?" Edward asks.

"They were all at the homestead a few days ago," Connor explains. "Huddled in a corner, talking about something they wanted to keep secret. I guess it must have been this."

"Guess so," Edward says. Then he doesn't say anything else because Ade is _there_, and Edward wants so badly to say something, warn him, do anything at all. But all he can do is watch as he and Haytham trade angry banter, circling each other with weapons drawn. Edward isn't really listening, until the conversation comes around to him.

"I served with your father, Haytham," Ade says. "He would be ashamed to see what you have become."

"Really?" Haytham asks, and he sounds actually amused by this. "I wasn't aware my father had a sense of shame."

"Excuse me?" Edward yells, loudly enough for Connor to flinch and Shay- sneaking around the fight from another angle, unseen by everyone but Edward, apparently- to almost lose his footing. No one else reacts at all, and Edward is reminded again how utterly powerless he is here. It doesn't stop him from shouting, though. "What did you just say about me, you ungrateful-"

Connor shakes his head and points at Shay, who has come around for another direction. Haytham draws away, giving the younger man a clearer line on Ade, and then- to Edward's complete surprise- Shay freezes. He's managed to knock Ade off his feet, but then he just stops moving, staring at his target like he can't make himself actually kill him.

"He's not going to do it," Edward whispers, scarcely believing the sight in front of him. "He's not going to kill him after all!"

He spins round to look at Connor, but Connor doesn't look at all excited. He's staring at Ade, face pale and almost… afraid. And then Edward sees it too, the pistol Ade has managed to draw while Shay struggles with his conscience, the shaking hand that points the weapon over Shay's shoulder at Haytham. And then he sees Ade's hand tighten on the grip, and knows exactly what's going to happen if Shay doesn't kill Ade before he can squeeze the trigger.

Haytham hasn't noticed the gun yet, but if he's shot, there's a good chance he will die right here. They're far from anyone that can help, and Ade has always been a very good shot. Shay still hasn't moved, and suddenly Edward can't… he just can't let Haytham die. His whole mind is filled with the image of _his son_ bleeding out, dying on the sand of an island far from home.

A few days ago, back in his own time, Edward had watched Haytham take his first uncertain steps on his own. He remembers the toddler's laughter, the look in his eyes as he finally managed to totter across the room without falling, and he realizes he has to choose, between his friend and his son, and that actually there is no choice at all.

He's not thinking about paradoxes or time travel as he sprints across the sand, straight at Shay. He knows Haytham survives long past this encounter, but Ade is about to shoot and Edward can't take the risk of not interfering. He bowls into Shay, and merges effortlessly back into his mind. It's not something he's ever tried to do before, but in his desperation the action is simple.

_"Edward!" _Shay gasps. _"What-"_

But Edward doesn't have time for this. He forces control of Shay's body away from him before the man can protest, steps forward, and stabs Ade himself. The blade slides in without resistance, and Ade is suddenly bleeding and gasping for breath in Edward's arms. The pistol drops from numb fingers, and Edward glances over his shoulder to check that Haytham is alright. Even through the horror and shock he can feel painted across his face, he registers a sharp relief that Haytham is fine.

His son walks over to him, puts a hand on his shoulder, and nods. "Well done, Shay," he says. "Take your time here, and meet me back on the _Morrigan _when you're done."

Edward doesn't say anything, doesn't move, doesn't even think. He just stares down at Ade, watching as the man struggles to fight the convulsions wracking his body and gasps for every painful breath, and curses the choice he's just made.

**-/-**

**I am a truly terrible human being, and I acknowledge this fact. I _swear_ the next chapter will make things a little better, though.**


	32. Chapter 32

_"Shay!" _Haytham shouts. _"Move!"_

_"I can't!" _Shay's frustration is a sharp pain in Haytham's mind. _"Edward won't let me do anything."_

_"How did he even do that?" _Haytham asks. _"It's your body, he shouldn't be able to steal control if you don't want him here. Right?"_

_"Sure he can," _Shay says. _"I do it to Desmond all the time, just because it's funny."_

_"_This _isn't funny," _Haytham says. _"This is life or death, and he doesn't know…"_

They both fall silent at that, and Haytham realizes he can hear Edward, very faintly, a constant mantra of _"Oh God what have I done"_ as he stares at Adewale, mixed occasionally with similar sentiments.

_"I think we broke him," _Haytham says quietly.

Quiet footsteps behind them shake Edward enough that he turns, and refocuses his blank stare on Connor.

"Hey," Connor says. He shifts his weight from one foot to the other, obviously uncomfortable. "Um… whoever's in there…"

"I killed him," Edward says. "I- Connor."

Connor shakes his head, clearly at a loss. He's not great at offering comfort, and at times like this it's extremely obvious. "You did it for dad, though," he offers after a long pause, and Haytham feels something freeze in shock inside him.

"I stabbed my friend," Edward says.

"To save your son," Connor argues. "Adewale was going to shoot him."

_"Oh," _Haytham whispers. He hadn't even _noticed_. He's lived through this scene twice now, and he hadn't seen- if Edward hadn't been around to save him, he would have been shot dead. He'd forced his father to choose between his son and his friend, and Haytham feels suddenly sick with the horror of what that means.

_"Say something," Shay urges._

_"What?"_

_"Something!" _Shay says. _"Anything, just do it fast. I need control back, fast."_

Haytham hesitates, then reaches for his father's presence in Shay's head, wrapping himself around the man, smoothing over the parts of his mind that are breaking under the strain of what he's just had to do. For half a heartbeat, Edward tries to resist, then he lets out half a sob and leans into Haytham, accepting whatever comfort he can get. Shay takes the opportunity to steal back control, but Haytham doesn't entirely follow what happens next. He hears the few quick words of explanation Shay gives Connor, and feels Shay start to move, but he only notices this distantly, as if it's happening from very far away.

_"...dad?" _he says quietly, trying to ignore how foreign the word sounds coming from him. He very rarely uses it, not since he was ten years old. This is not the time to worry about that.

Edward doesn't answer. As far as there is physical space inside Shay's head, Haytham and Shay are pressed tightly together, so tightly that it's difficult to tell where one stops and the other begins. Shay keeps moving, occasionally speaking to Connor but mostly in silence. Haytham ignores him- he trusts the man to do this right.

Finally, Edward speaks. _"I killed him," _he says, and there's a terrible blankness in his voice. _"I didn't even think about it, I just-"_

_"He's not dead."_

Edward draws back a little, disbelief and hope fighting for purchase in his beaten mind. _"What?"_

_"We _knew _this was going to happen," _Haytham explains. _"After you said… what you said-" _There's no point in rehashing that fight. _"We put some more thought into the issue. None of us wanted Adewale dead, I promise. So we came up with a way to save him."_

_"But then-" _Edward sounds, if anything, more miserable than before. _"I messed everything up. You would have saved him, and I killed him anyway."_

_"No! Dad-"_

_"Haytham, I _stabbed _him."_

_"With a dulled blade coated in poison," _Haytham says, with a forced calmness. _"The blade isn't sharp enough to go in far. Shay has the antidote to the poison. It's a nonlethal toxin, although t does cause seizures and slowed breathing. Enough to convince- well, convince me- that I was looking at a dead body."_

_"But he's going to live?" _Edward asks.

Haytham would have smiled if he'd had a body of his own._ "Short of extremely bad luck, your friend is going to live."_

For the first time, Edward seems to notice Shay's efforts- by this point, he's administered the antidote and wrapped a thick bandage around Adewale's torso. "You're welcome," Shay says. "This would have gone a lot easier if you'd just let me stab him.

_"You were slow," _Edward says. _"And I had to… before he shot you."_

_"Thank you," _Haytham says. _"I'm sorry you had to choose, but… thank you."_

_"Thank you for saving him," _Edward says. _"I'm sorry for everything I said. I'm sorry for being angry and leaving. I should have trusted you, or at least tried to work things out with you."_

_"It's okay," Haytham says. "He's your friend. You had a right to be upset."_

_"It's not _really_ okay," _Shay says. _"It was really rude."_

_"Way to ruin the mood," _Edward complains. _"We were having a moment here, and you just had to interrupt."_

_"I'm serious," _Shay says. _"Listen, I wasn't too sure about all this when Desmond first invaded my head, but we're all stuck together now. You should have known that already, and that means you should have known to trust the rest of us."_

_"Next time I will," _Edward promises.

On the ground, Adewale starts to stir and moan quietly.

_"We should get out of here before he wakes up," _Haytham says. _"If he doesn't see you here, he'll assume he just got lucky to have survived. He'll make it back to a ship eventually. But if you _are _here…"_

_"I'm leaving," _Shay announces, walking in the direction of his ship. _"I don't want to deal with that. Adewale will be fine on his own."_

"Wait," Connor says, jogging after Shay. "So everything's fine, now?"

"More or less," Shay says.

"I'm so confused," Connor grumbles.

"Not my fault you're not in my head," Shay says.

Connor doesn't answer- not in words, anyway. He considers Shay's words for a moment, nods like he's decided something, and walks right up to the templar.

"What are you-"

And then Connor walks right into Shay. _"What?" _he asks, when everyone suddenly focuses their attention on him. _"Edward did the same thing, no one thought it was weird then."_

_"He also stabbed his friend right afterward," _Haytham points out. _"Walking into Shay's head wasn't the most surprising part of that."_

_"It's not that hard," _Connor says.

_"Useful talent, though," _Shay says, and Edward makes a noise of agreement. Haytham considers arguing, but gives up without trying. He doesn't mind the weirdness, and anyway Shay's head is technically large enough to hold all three of them. Haytham finds himself squeezed between Edward and Connor, but doesn't mind at all. There are worse ways to end up in someone's head than wedged between the two people that matter most to him in the world, after all.


	33. Chapter 33

They stop fighting after that.

Even when Shay's travels takes him to other assassins, even when they die beneath his blade, no one raises any objections. Sometimes Altair feels bad about that, because these are members of the brotherhood Shay is killing, and whatever mistakes they have made, they should have his protection. But it's more complicated- this is Shay's life, not his. Shay is not an assassin, not anymore, and he's doing what he thinks is right. Besides, he'd gone out of his way to save Adewale, and- well, it's not like he's any worse than Haytham, and no one has a problem with him. Anymore.

Shay's memories continue, and things fall into a tentative status quo. Without the apples, they still can't control when they travel from one century to another- Edward, for example, goes through long stretches of time in his own life between getting to see the others, while Haytham is in Shay's head nearly all the time but rarely in anyone else's. Altair and Connor fall somewhere in the middle, and Desmond uses the animus to influence his own travels.

There's a definite feeling of _conclusion_ when they find the piece of Eden hidden in the Artic, but Altair isn't sure what sort of conclusion it is, exactly. He wants to believe that Shay will somehow reconcile with Achilles and Liam, and rejoin the assassins, but that ending would have been far too neat and simple. Besides, Haytham would undoubtedly have said something by now if Shay wasn't supposed to stay a templar.

No, the best they can hope for is everyone walking away alive, and Altair has some reason to think this is possible. There are only four of them there, racing and fighting their way through the ice and caves to the precursor site, and of those four, three of them are definitely still alive in the future. Haytham hasn't even met any of them yet, Achilles will one day be Connor's mentor, and Shay needs to live long enough to figure out what those strange memories of France are supposed to be. That only leaves Liam.

And of course, there are half a dozen invisible watchers stalking the fight, offering commentary and waiting for the conclusion. For whatever reason, this memory is important enough to draw all of them there- Altair looks around and sees Connor, Haytham, Edward, and Desmond alongside himself, all looking relatively unhappy at the way this had turned out.

Altair half turns to Haytham to ask how all this ends, then shakes his head and turns away. Judging by the look on the man's face, this memory does not work out.

"He already knows," Haytham says when he catches Altair looking.

"Knows what?" Altair asks.

"Everything about this memory," Haytham says. "We've talked it over, in absolutely mind numbing detail. I wanted him to know what he was going to have to do before he did it."

There's an enormous crash from the place where Shay and Liam have been fighting, and Altair turns to see the ice crumbling, and Liam falling with Shay just behind him.

"That was his best friend, wasn't it?" Altair asks.

"Yes," says Haytham.

"And he's going to kill him."

"Yes."

Altair sighs, and turns his back on the whole scene. "I'll be happy when we're done with Shay's memories," he admits. "He doesn't seem to have any good ones at all."

"It does seem like that," Haytham agrees quietly. They watch in silence as the rest of the memory plays out- the destruction of the piece of Eden, the earthquakes that threaten to tear the ice apart, and finally Haytham's crippling of Achilles. Connor comes over then, arms crossed and clearly ready to say something to his father about that.

"Why did you-"

"Oh, come on," Haytham sighs. "You can't tell me he didn't deserve that. After what you've seen from Shay?"

Connor opens his mouth, closes it again, and suddenly seems to be studying the snow at his feet very intently. "This is hard," he says at last. "Things were a lot clearer before Shay."

"Oh I'm sorry," Haytham says, and his voice is absolutely dripping with sarcasm. "Do you have to start thinking about right and wrong now? I wouldn't want you to strain yourself."

"Dad," Connor moans. "I'm trying to…" but he stops, trailing off as he struggles to put words to what he's feeling. Altair nods reassuringly- he knows exactly what Connor is going through, because the truth is it's getting harder to draw lines between enemies and allies. They're supposed to be killing templars, but Shay had just killed an assassin, and Haytham crippled another one, and not even Connor can argue that his mentor's injury was unwarranted.

"I know," Haytham says, clearly surprising Connor. "And I'm…" he glances at Altair, who takes the hint and excuses himself, heading to where the others are starting to group together. He doesn't quite leave quickly enough to miss Haytham's next words to Connor, though. "I'm proud of you."

"So what now?" Edward asks. He, Shay, and Desmond are standing in a huddle nearby, but it's obviously Altair that he's addressing his question to. "We're done here, right?"

Altair only shrugs. He has no idea what's going to happen.

"I hope so," Shay says quietly, most likely so that no one else will hear him talking to (apparently) himself. He crosses his arms and keeps his back to the place where Liam's body lies. "Can we look at someone else's memories now? I want to just sit around and comment on what's going on in someone else's life."

"We still need to figure out what's happening with your French memories," Desmond points out. "And then…" he shakes his head. "I don't know. Hopefully we'll be done with the animus after this. I don't think I could take anymore memories."

"I don't know," Edward says. "It could be worse. Keeps life interesting."

That forces a laugh from Altair, just because it's such an understatement. As if the noise serves as a signal of some kind, the whole atmosphere seems to brighten. Just a little.

"It doesn't matter what happens next," Haytham says dismissively, striding over to join the rest of the group, Connor just behind him. "As long as we manage to avoid getting separated again. That was inconvenient."

"I agree," Edward says. "You guys are a bunch of assholes-"

"Thanks, dad."

"But you make life better," Edward goes on. "Usually." For a second after that, everyone just stands around trying to figure out what to say next, and then Edward shakes his head. "Okay," he says. "That's enough of the bonding. I need a drink."


	34. Chapter 34

Right after that, Desmond feels a jerk in his gut like someone has stuck a hook in him and started to pull, and suddenly he's back in the broken version of France, still in Shay's head and everyone else gone. _"Well, that was good timing," _Shay says, trying to make the best of things. _"That was about to get awkward."_

_"You have no idea," _Desmond says. _"You've never seen Edward drunk before."_

_"Nasty drunk?" _Shay asks.

_"There are three forms to Edward's drunkenness," _Desmond explains. _"He either loves everyone and everything, he's depressed and making sure everyone knows it, or he's asleep in a cart full of hay somewhere."_

Shay laughs, and they start moving, searching for whatever it is Shay has come here to find, or do, or (more than likely) kill. This time, their focus is clearly centered on one building in particular, and soon enough Desmond is pointing out the golden figure of their target that is clearly visible even from several rooms away. The rich setting tells him this is no simple courier (or hypothetical dentist). Most likely, that means-

_"It's an assassin," _Shay says, echoing Desmond's unhappy conclusion.

_"Are you going to kill him?" _Desmond asks, because that's the kind of thing he has to ask these days.

_"I don't… this guy could be anyone!" _He calms a little, just enough to consider his options. _"But if future me is going to kill him, shouldn't I be able to trust myself enough to believe I have a good reason?" _This time, he stops long enough to give Desmond a chance to actually answer.

But all he can say is, _"I don't know."_

_"Thank you for that, Desmond," _Shay snaps. _"You're being very helpful today."_

_"I don't know the future you," _Desmond goes on, ignoring the understandable burst of anger. _"But I do trust the current you. Whatever the circumstances here, I think you can make the right decision."_

_"Oh," _Shay says, and his racing thoughts calm a little farther. _"Okay, this is what I'll do. If I came all the way to France for this guy, he's probably important. I can't risk _not _killing him, because he might be a serious danger of some kind."_

_"Fair enough," _Desmond says.

_"But I want to know who he is and why I'm killing him," _Shay goes on. _"I'll need to leave right away when he's dead."_

_"Obviously," _Desmond agrees, looking around at the crowds and tight spaces of the building.

_"So get out of my head and stick around when the assassin is dead," _Shay says. _"At least as long as the animus lets you." _They still don't know how much freedom these broken memories will allow, but it looks like they're about to test that.

Desmond pushes against Shay's head until he's falling out and onto his own feet. The memory looks a little less solid, if that's possible, with Shay being the only real solid thing. "Woah," Desmond says, and his voice echoes and wobbles in his ears. "Let's try not to do this again."

Shay nods, silent now that Desmond can't hear his thoughts, and they progress toward Shay's target. Desmond trails a step or two behind, staring around him at the surreal quality of the building. And then… they pass through the garden, and he notices the boy.

It's a small child, maybe ten years old, maybe younger, laughing and shrieking in obvious delight as he chases a girl through a maze. Desmond drifts closer, curious as to why some random child would seem more real than the rest of the world.

And then the child looks up at him, and _sees him_, and frowns. He says something in French, voice high and childish but clearly questioning. Desmond is still staring at him, reeling from the fact that someone had seen him. He's been through the memories of five ancestors- plus Shay, no relation- and never once has anyone seen him.

The girl shouts something back, apparently thinking the boy is talking to her, but the boy ignores her and calls to someone on the other side of the hedge. Desmond swears and takes a step or two back as that someone steps into view.

It's him. Desmond stares at himself, openmouthed and shocked, taking in the impossibility of an identical doppelganger showing up out of nowhere. His mind scrabbles for explanations, but finds none. This is an absolute impossibility.

While he's shocked and surprised, the other-Desmond is clearly expecting this. He crosses the space between them, and gives Desmond a shove. It's not hard, just forceful enough to send Desmond stumbling back. "Go!" other-Desmond shouts.

"Go _where_?" Desmond demands, utterly confused.

"Get to Shay before he kills anyone," other-Desmond says. Between them, the boy listens in big eyed silence. "And _stop _him. This is a mistake."

"That assassin-"

"Doesn't need to die," other-Desmond says. _"_Seriously, _trust _me." He reaches out to shove Desmond again, but Desmond's already running. He doesn't understand how any of this is happening, but he's not going to argue with himself just now.

It takes him several long minutes to find the place where Shay is, only feet away from his target.

"Shay!" Desmond shouts, as soon as he catches sight of the man. "No, don't-"

He's too late. Shay hears him, but by the time he's looked back and actually processed the words, his blade is buried in the target's back, and Desmond knows the man is dead. Shay gives him a confused look, but there's no time to say anything before the boy who'd seen him earlier comes rushing in. He stops in the doorway, breathing hard, and stares at the dead man through eyes wide as saucers.

Desmond still can't speak French, but there's no mistaking the hurt and miserable shock in his voice as the boy cries for his father and pushes forward, pressing against the crowd of bodies, squeezing between legs until he finally reaches Shay's target. For his part, Shay glances down at the body, then back at Desmond once more before turning and making the quickest possible escape.

There are footsteps behind him, and suddenly other-Desmond is at his shoulder. "So that happened," he says, not sounding surprised at all.

"What's going on?" Desmond demands. "How are there two of us here?"

"I'd say it's complicated, but what isn't?" other-Desmond asks. "I'm you, from like… a week in the future. I'm in his memories-" he gestures at the now sobbing boy. "You're in Shay's. But they overlap, and Shay's memory is messed up and out of order anyway, so…" he shrugs. "Here we are."

"Who's the boy?" Desmond asks.

"Arno Victor Dorian," other-Desmond says. He says it with great emphasis, as if to make sure Desmond will not forget. "You'll be seeing him again soon enough."

"Clearly," Desmond says, and he stares at Arno's tiny, sobbing form until the memory ends and he's ejected from the animus. Shay is nearby, invisible to everyone but Desmond, and Violet is on her way across the room toward him, looking positively ecstatic. In the scarce moments before she arrives, Shay looks at Desmond.

"We screwed up, didn't we?" he asks, and Desmond can do little more than nod in response.

**-/-**

**Next chapter: Desmond the templar**


	35. Chapter 35

There are four people in Melanie's office, not counting Shay. He is a silent, invisible observer, watching as Melanie, Violet, and Berg explain to Desmond exactly how this has to go, and why he has no choice but to join them as a templar.

Desmond listens in silence, shoulders hunched against the unhappy memory of what he had just seen in the animus, and all Shay can do is watch. The whole scene kind of bothers him, actually. _He's _a templar, and choosing to defect from the assassins is one of the best decisions he's ever made. But Desmond is an assassin all the way through, and Shay doesn't like watching him force himself to accept the templar ring.

He crosses the room, boots loud in the otherwise silent room, and says, "You don't have to do this."

Before Desmond can react in any way, Shay slides into him, inserting himself into the assassin's mind, and gently pulling control of Desmond's body away from him. Desmond doesn't offer even a token protest, surrendering willingly.

Shay takes a deep breath, orienting himself to Desmond's body before moving. This is definitely not the first time he's stolen Desmond's body, but it's the first time he's done so in front of anyone else. He doesn't want to screw this up and make it obvious he's not really Desmond. For a second, he's painfully aware of every inch of Desmond's body, and every difference between them. They're nearly the exact same height, but Desmond is lighter and thinner- he relies more on his agility and speed than his strength, and it shows. Shay takes a second to adjust, feeling Desmond's features settle until they feel natural, and only then does he move.

He tilts his head, studying the faces of the people around him, and reaches for the ring Melanie offers him. "Thank you," he says, and the words come from Desmond's mouth, in Desmond's voice. "This is an honor."

The ring fits on Desmond's finger perfectly, and Shay stares at it for a minute. In the back of his mind, he feels Desmond growing somber and sad. _"So I'm a templar now," _he says.

_"Don't be ridiculous," _Shay says dismissively. _"You never accepted the ring. You didn't agree to this. It was all me, remember?"_

_"But they don't know that."_

_"Who cares what they know?" _Shay asks._ "We both know you're still an assassin. As soon as you have the information you need, we'll be out of here and they'll never see you again. And honestly, Desmond, you'd make a terrible templar."_

_"Hey!"_

_"We don't want you," _Shay continues, managing to wring a small thread of amusement out of Desmond. _"You're not invited."_

He takes the templar oath, again. It's a lot less exciting than it had been in his own timeline, but Shay manages to get through it without making anyone suspicious. And then that's it- everything's over. Violet escorts him out, handing him the file on the Instruments of the First Will as they leave the office.

"You were asking about this earlier, weren't you?" she asks.

"Yea," Shay says. "Yea, I was curious."

"It's an interesting case," Violet says, handing the file over. "Good instincts."

Shay nods his thanks, but doesn't get a chance to start flipping through it before she's pulling him back. "Oh," she added. "One more thing."

"Yea?"

"I need you to upload the animus data from Shay's memories," Violet says. "We have a console in the basement, and it links directly to the servers the assassins are using."

"Why?" Shay asks, studying Desmond's communicator as the file appears in his inbox. "What's the point?"

"To show them," Violet says. "They will always lose, because they will always be betrayed. There are so many examples throughout history of assassins that have turned from the templar cause to the assassins, but there are barely any instances of of a templar going to the assassins."

This reply actually makes Shay angry. _"She's about to get one," _he complains to Desmond. _"I swear, this is the stupidest plan I've ever heard."_

_"It's pretty awful," _Desmond agrees.

_"Suddenly I feel a tiny bit ashamed for being on the same side as these people." _He switches to speaking aloud. "So you're telling me that you have a direct link to the assassins, a group you have been fighting for hundreds of years, and you're using that link to send them annoying e-mails. And not, say, to get any kind of tactical advantage at all."

Desmond laughs at this, long and hard, so that even though he's not in control of his own body at the moment, Shay still has to fight to keep a smile off his face.

"It's important," Violet insists, and Shay throws up his hands.

"Fine," he says. "If you say so."

They make it as far as the elevator before Desmond stops laughing long enough to start pressing against Shay's mind, impatiently requesting the return of his body. Shay moves aside to let him take over, and they stumble a little as the elevator doors open, control passing from templar to assassin midstride. Desmond glances up, sees a lack of security cameras, and pulls the ring off. _"This is ridiculous. They're all idiots."_

_"Agreed," _Shay says. _"Let's get this done and get out of here."_

In the basement, Desmond uploads the file as instructed and watches lines of text scroll across the monitor display. Mostly they seem confused about what the point of this is, and Shay- reading the increasingly confused questions flash by- can't blame them. _"There," _he says. _"We're done here."_

_"Time to go," _Desmond says. _"Goodbye Abstergo."_

**_-/-_**

**Three notes: **

**1-seriously, what was the point of sending the data to the assassins at the end of Rogue? Like, they have a way to contact the assassins and Abstergo's doing the digital spy version of teenagers TP'ing someone's front yard. Like, unless I'm missing something there's _no _point.**

**2-a couple of people have asked if Desmond's a templar now. No, of course not. Desmond's just not the kind of guy that would be a templar, especially without a good reason. Basically whenever someone calls him a templar they're either confused because he's undercover (Abstergo), purposefully trying to insult him (Edward when he thought Desmond wanted Ade dead) or just trying to bother him (basically every other time).**

**3- thank you to the reviewers that pointed out Maria Thorpe is an example of a templar turned assassin. Fixed that.**


	36. Chapter 36

Desmond is finally allowed out of Abstergo after that, and he waits just long enough to get out of sight before running. It feels so good to be running in his own body again that he wants to laugh out loud- Shay waits in silence until Desmond has worked out his restlessness and slowed to a more normal pace.

_"You're a madman," _Shay announces. _"Won't they wonder why you never came back?"_

_"Doesn't matter," _Desmond says dismissively. _"It's only a problem if they find me, and they won't."_

_"You sound confident."_

_"I am free as a bird," _Desmond announces. _"They'll never mind me!" _He throws his hands in the air, and Shay laughs.

_"Why are you so crazy?"_

It's cold and starting to snow, so Desmond quickly sobers, at least enough to focus on getting back to the closest assassin safehouse. It's not the one he'd left Shaun and Rebecca at, but they'd been planning to move north to be nearby, just in case something went wrong, and when he walks in the front door Rebecca is on top of him almost at once.

"Desmond!" she says, wrapping him in an enthusiastic hug. "You're not dead!"

"Nope," he says. "I did really well, no one even knew I was undercover."

"Really?"

"I did such a good job they made me a templar."

She studies him for a second, then apparently decides he's joking and laughs- Desmond pulls the ring out of his pocket and watches her eyes go wide. "Oh," she says. "Wow. I feel like there's a pretty weird story in there somewhere. Did you get your ancestors back?"

"Yes," Desmond says. "Mostly. Ezio…" he swallows hard and looks down at his shoes. "He's dead." It's the first time he's really had to tell anyone, and the words feel like stones in his mouth. The worst part is the fragments of him still left on Desmond's mind, like a ghost constantly reminding him that the man _should _be there but _isn't_.

"I'm so sorry," Rebecca says. "I liked Ezio."

"Everyone liked Ezio," Desmond agrees. He's silent for a second, then on an impulse, he goes on. "I was in his head when he died."

Rebecca's eyes go wide, and she hugs him a second time. Desmond lets it happen, closing his eyes to fend off the sudden memories prodding at him. Then he pulls away. "And there's another guy in my head now," he says. "His name's Shay, he's a templar, usually not a dick-"

_"Hey!"_

"I was in his memories while I was undercover," Desmond goes on. "And he found some precursor artifact and now he's in my head, so…"

"And he's a templar?" Rebecca asks, frowning.

Desmond shrugs, trying to make the motion casual. "He worked with Haytham, and he says Shay's not that bad, if that helps."

Rebecca sighs and throws up her hands. "I give up," she says. "It's your head, you can invite anyone in that you want."

"I should probably also mention that he likes to steal my body sometimes," Desmond adds. "Not really maliciously, just to be annoying. So… he might introduce himself at some point."

He looks around for the first time, and realizes there's no sign of anyone else. "Are you the only one here?" he asks. "Where's Shaun?"

"France," she says. "On another assignment."

"They split you up?" Desmond asks. "I thought I'd never see the day. The two of you work so well together."

"Well now that you're back, we can go meet up with him," Rebecca says. "He just went on ahead to start setting up."

"Setting up what?"

"You might have heard about this, actually," Rebecca says. "Since you've been at Abstergo. Did anyone ever talk about Helix?"

"Yea," Desmond says. "I wasn't directly involved, but it's basically a way of turning all these animus sessions into a game. Which is weird, if you ask me. Who would think this kind of stuff is fun?"

"The world is full of strange people," Rebecca says. "Anyway, we're hacking into the machines of anyone that looks like they might be… sympathetic to our cause. There's this French assassin we're interested in, we think he might have some interesting information, so we're going to see if anyone can get far enough to get anything useful."

"Sounds interesting," Desmond says. "Who is this guy?"

"His name's Arno Dorian," Rebecca says, and Desmond freezes where he stands. In his head, Shay is suddenly completely focused on the conversation for the first time since they walked in.

"I met him," he says. "In the animus, when I was going through Shay's memories."

"And?"

"Shay- I…" he takes a deep breath. "We killed his father. It's a long story, and we didn't have all the details."

"Desmond, what-" she looks at him, horrified, and Desmond feels a familiar churn of guilt that is as much Shay's as his. "Why would you do that?"

"It was a mistake," Shay says, and Desmond doesn't stop him when the other man takes temporary control. The need to explain and to be heard is like a burning fire in Shay's head, and it's not like he's saying anything Desmond disagrees with. "I thought I was doing the right thing, but…" he clenches one hand into a fist. "Never again," he says. "I promise."

"I'm going to make it up to him," Desmond says, and Shay steps back without protest. They've gotten this sharing control of his body down to a science by now. "You said you have a way inside his memories, right?"

"Well, yea," Rebecca says. "But-"

"I'm going in," Desmond says. "I know I can get inside the memories of people I'm not technically related to thanks to Shay."

"I don't know if that's a great idea," Rebecca says.

"Also," Desmond says. "There was a point when I was inside Shay's memories, and they happened to overlap with Arno's memories. And I saw myself, in Arno's memories."

"Wait, what-"

"Me in the future," Desmond says. "We talked, and he said he was in Arno's head, so clearly I don't have a choice about doing this, do I?"

"I guess not," Rebecca says. "I just want you to be safe."

"Thanks," Desmond says. The room goes quiet for a second, and then she looks down at the file in his hands.

"So what's that?" she asks, and Desmond starts- he's almost forgotten about his stolen templar intelligence.

"That's what I came to find," he says. "Information on the Instruments of the First Will. Hopefully enough to tell us how they drained the apples, and why they would want to in the first place."

"Oh!" Rebecca comes closer, obviously interested. "So what are you waiting for?"

Desmond shrugs, opens the file, and starts to read.


	37. Chapter 37

**Note- the stuff about ancient religions is accurate as far as I know. I actually read something about this for a class last semester, and suddenly got interested when the name Juno popped up in my textbook. So if I'm misunderstanding things, whoops, my bad. This is an alternate universe anyway.**

Shay watches through Desmond's eyes as he pages through the file. Most of it is written in a dry, academic tone that Shay has issues reading- it's very dissimilar from what he's used to from his own time- and Desmond seems to be struggling a little as well. He does finally get through the whole thing, though, and Shay can feel black edges of despair creeping into his mind.

"What is it?" Rebecca asks as soon as she sees his face. "How bad?"

"There's… okay, so it's kind of confusing," Desmond admits. "I wish Shaun was here, actually, because it starts with a kind of history lesson." He and Rebecca move deeper into the safehouse, settling next to each other at a sturdy wooden table. Desmond spreads the file out and starts pointing to things as he speaks. "We know that Juno was the name of a goddess in ancient Roman times."

"That's pretty much common knowledge," Rebecca agrees. "And?"

"Well whoever put this file together points out that it's likely the Romans knew about- you know, our Juno."

"The one you guys killed last year," Rebecca says.

"Right," Desmond says. "So she was a namesake for this Roman goddess. Which kind of makes sense, when you think about it. I mean, if she ever interacted with anyone in that time, they would have seen a giant glowing lady and assumed she was a goddess."

"And? What does that have to do with anything?" Rebecca rapped the knuckles of one fist on the table impatiently. "This is all ancient history, right? It's so old it doesn't matter to us."

Shay starts to stir angrily- being born in an earlier century doesn't make him useless- but Desmond gets there first. "There's a two hundred year old man in my head that objects to that comment," he says, and Rebecca seems to soften a little.

"Fine," she says. "So what's the relevance here?"

"Whoever wrote this went a little deeper," Desmond explains. "The gods in some ancient civilizations- mostly Greek, but occasionally Roman- were unique in every city where they were worshipped. So if two different cities worshipped a goddess Juno, they believed they were worshipping two different versions of the same goddess. If one city conquered the other, they would capture all the gods sacred in that city and claim them as sacred to _their _city. That includes gods and goddesses with the same name as the deities they already worshipped."

"And…?"

"There could have been a goddess called Juno in every city," Desmond says.

"But there's only one actual Juno," Rebecca says.

"That's what we thought," Desmond says, hesitantly. "But the thing is… these people knew her well enough to know her name. They named a goddess- they named the queen of their gods after her. That's a big deal. What if they had a point about this 'multiple Juno' thing?"

"That's kind of a…" Rebecca trails off, staring down at the table as Desmond flips over a piece of paper. "Stretch."

_"I don't get it," _Shay says. The paper is full of photographs of women- dark, fair, old, young, tall, and short. The oldest seems to be at least ninety, bowed by age and covered in wrinkles, while the youngest looks barely ten, beaming at the camera from behind a wide, toothy smile. They seem to come from all walks of life, all over the world, and at first Shay sees no similarities between the half dozen or so pictures on the table.

Then he sees their eyes. They are dark, and empty, and dead. Curious, he goes digging through Desmond's memories, until he finds one of the Juno he and Rebecca keep talking about. He knows who she is, of course. Vaguely. He's heard the others mention her once or twice, and he knows she's (supposed to be) dead. But it's not until he unearths Desmond's memory of her that he recognizes the dead eyes from the pictures as hers.

"They're all Juno," Desmond says, in answer to both Shay's question and Rebecca's horrified look. "Becca, you remember the sage Altair met at Abstergo last year, right? He figured out that he had so much precursor DNA he basically _was _one of them?"

"John," Rebecca says. "Yea, I remember him."

"Same thing with them," Desmond says, gesturing again to the photographs on the table. "There are half a dozen copies of Juno in the world, and _they _are the instruments of the first will."

"Well…" Rebecca sucks in a breath, then laughs in a way that makes it sound like she wants to cry instead. "Well _shit_."

"Pretty much," Desmond says.

"At least that explains how they were able to drain the apples," Rebecca says. "I mean, if they have any of Juno's knowledge, then that sounds like a perfectly reasonable thing for them to be able to do."

"I agree," Desmond says. "Probably they needed it for power, or something…" he trails off, staring blankly at nothing.

_"Desmond?"_

"What's wrong?" Rebecca asks.

"I'm so stupid," Desmond says, and a second later he's out of his chair and on his feet. "The apples need power, and we- Rebecca, did you bring the dead apples with you when you moved up here?"

"Of course," she says, gesturing toward a corner of the room obviously used for storage. "Dead or not, they didn't seem safe to leave behind."

"Perfect," Desmond says. _"Shay, get out of my head."_

Shay follows the order without question, more out of confusion than anything else. He doesn't hesitate to follow Desmond as he hurries toward the place Rebecca had indicated, though.

"What's going on?"

"Remember, when we first found that artifact in Lisbon?"

"I do," Shay says coldly. He hates when anyone brings up Lisbon, and Desmond _knows _that. "So?"

"The artifact dissolved."

"And caused an earthquake," Shay says. "Trust me, I remember. But-"

"We both got some of the energy inside us," Desmond says. "Just pure, first civilization energy. That means…" he stops, bends over, and picks up a dull silver sphere lying on the ground. "That energy can be used to recharge the apples."

Shay watches cautiously as Desmond suddenly seems to light up, glowing with a soft golden light that moves quickly from him to the apple. The air has an electric quality that makes the hairs on the back of Shay's neck stand on end, and it smells like the air just before a storm. Then, in almost no time at all, the light has moved from Desmond to the sphere, and faded to a more manageable glow.

"This," Desmond says. "Is an apple."

"How is that better than having the energy inside you?" Shay asks.

"It's easier to control like this," Desmond says. "With the apple, I can choose when I time travel, and which century I go to."

"Really?"

"Trust me," Desmond says, suddenly grim. "I've spent a lot of time with these things. I know how they work."

"Oh," Shay says. He picks up a second apple, and under Desmond's expectant gaze, imagines himself pushing the energy inside him into the apple. It goes easily enough, and before long Shay is holding a glowing sphere that seems to pulse softly in his hand.

He looks up at Desmond, expecting approval, but instead finds Desmond focusing on the apple as it sort of… gets absorbed into his skin. It flickers, half visible, and then is suddenly gone. Complex lines of pure light flash on Desmond's skin, and then vanish. He makes a fist and grins at Shay. "Yea," he says, and somehow he sounds more _real _now than he ever has before. "That will do nicely."

"Do I have to do that?" Shay asks. "The whole… apple disappearing trick?"

"No," Desmond says. "I'd actually prefer if you didn't. The apple in me is my apple- the one you have is Altair's. He's fairly good with it."

"And the third?" Shay asks, gesturing to the still empty sphere on the ground between them.

"That was Ezio's," Desmond says quietly.

"Oh."

"Yea. We don't… it's better if we don't recharge it anyway," Desmond mutters.

"We'll need every advantage we can get, if these Juno duplicates are as bad as you say they are," Shay points out.

"Don't worry about it," Desmond says. He seems much more confident than he had mere minutes ago. "We have the apples back, now. And we've already destroyed one Juno- how much trouble can the others be?"

**-/-**

**Hopefully this makes some sense. *fingers crossed ***


	38. Chapter 38

Altair is with Maria when Desmond steps out of thin air and just freezes in the doorway, staring at the two of them like he's just walked in on his parents in bed. Which, to be fair, he more or less has. Maria sees him and goes scrambling for cover, and Altair feels his face turn extremely red. Under literally any other circumstances, he'd be more interested in Desmond's reappearance (physically, not just in his head) or the golden lines criss crossing his skin, or the apple in his hand. But right now Maria is glaring at him and Desmond is determinedly looking anywhere but at the pair of them, and Altair is gradually realizing that he's the one that's going to have to explain all of this.

"I… am sorrier than you could possibly know," Desmond says after a pause that lasts over a minute. "Um… I'm just going to…" he flees the room before either of them can recover, but as soon as he's gone Maria rounds on Altair, eyes narrowed in anger.

"Who was that?" she asks. "Some relative of yours?"

There's no use denying it, not with the obvious resemblance between him and Desmond, so Altair doesn't try. "Yes," he says. "A distant relative."

"He glows," Maria says.

"I know."

"And doesn't knock."

"…I will speak to him about it," Altair says, although he honestly has no intention of ever discussing this with Desmond. Or anyone else, for that matter. Ever. With the mood thoroughly ruined, he throws in clothes and goes looking for Desmond.

He finds him with Malik, having an apparently very casual conversation about the technical aspects of swordplay. Altair eyes the pair nervously, but apparently Desmond has not mentioned what he walked in on Altair and Maria doing. Altair is extremely grateful for this, because if Malik had known he would not have allowed Altair to live the encounter down.

Malik notices Altair's unease and steps away, leaving the two of them alone. "I'm glad I got to meet him in person," he says. "I don't think I've ever met Malik outside of your body."

Altair waits in silence for Desmond to bring up him and Maria, but that doesn't happen, and the silence stretches on until finally Altair breaks it. "I was told to tell you to knock next time."

"I'll keep that in mind," Desmond says. "And I never want to talk about that again, by the way."

"Thank you," Altair says. "So-" he nods eagerly at the apple. "Apple. How?"

Desmond catches him up in quick, short sentences, and then hands Altair his apple back. When it's safely back inside him, Altair smiles. It's not as good as getting Desmond and the others back, but it's still satisfying. "So this Arno," he says when the apple is settled. "What are we going to do about him?"

"Help him as much as possible," Desmond says. "He deserves that, if nothing else."

"What about Shay?"

"He feels as bad about this as I do," Desmond says. "I think… I don't know, but I think he'd like the chance to make up for what he's done."

"Then I'm on board," Altair says. "I'll help."

"As if you had a choice," Desmond scoffs, but the he smiles. "Thanks."

"I almost hate to bring it up," Altair says, letting the apple light up on his skin. "But we could just go back and change it. Save Arno's father."

"No," Desmond says. "I'd love it if we could do that, but… the paradoxes. And then even if it works, where do we stop? What's the line? We could rule all of time, if we wanted to, but I don't think that's a path I want to go down." He sighs, and for a moment Altair feels very sorry for him. "I just… I mean, it makes sense, but how are supposed to explain this to Arno? Sorry, your dad's dead but we won't save him, even though we could, because it might break time."

"He might understand," Altair says.

"He's ten," Desmond says. "And you didn't see his face. He's not going to understand."

"Well…" Altair gives this a moment of thought, and then shakes his head. "There's no point standing around and talking about it. We might as well get it over with."

Desmond nods and on some unspoken symbol they both travel forward to the future. It's been a while since he's used the apple, but it's a skill that doesn't seem to fade with lack of practice- Altair has no trouble at all following Desmond to his own time. Rebecca's the only one there when they arrive, and she looks only vaguely surprised to see Altair appear from nowhere.

"Hey," she says, and Altair nods a greeting. "You're here for Arno, too?"

"To lend support, at least," Altair says.

"I saw myself in the animus," Desmond adds. "So I guess I need to be the one to meet him first."

"Sure," Rebecca sighs. "Why not?" She gets up and leads the way to a back room that Altair hasn't noticed before. "I have a helix set up back here.

Desmond follows after her, with Altair trailing both of them several seconds behind. "I thought we were going to meet up with Shaun," Desmond says.

"He is… working with someone else," Rebecca says in a forced casual tone. "And luckily Helix is incredibly easy to get ahold of, so we'll just be here."

"Okay," Desmond says, waiting as she sets up the machine. It looks more like a video game console than something related to the animus, but from what Altair's heard, that's exactly what it's been advertised as. He supposes it makes sense.

It still makes him uneasy.

"Okay," Desmond says. "I'm ready to meet Arno."


	39. Chapter 39

Arno is studying his father's watch as intently as he is capable when a half visible man appears in the hall across from the place Arno has been left. He hears the man's footsteps on the ground and looks up, startled, as the man sits down at Arno's side. "Are you a ghost, monsieur?" he asks, and the man shakes his head.

"No," he says. His voice sounds sad, and Arno smiles at him.

"If you're alive, you should be happy," he says. "Today is a good day."

"It's not," the man says quietly. He holds out a hand, and Arno is surprised that he can grasp it when he takes it. "My name's Desmond."

"Arno," says Arno. He notices that the man seems to be studying the watch in his hand, and holds it out for his inspection. "This is my father's," he says proudly. "He let me keep it for him until he's done with his business."

Desmond takes Arno's hand gently, and closes his fingers around the watch. He feels as solid as any normal person, and for a minute Arno thinks of asking him how that can be. Then Desmond speaks again.

"Be careful with it," he says. "Don't let it break."

"I won't break it," Arno scoffs. "I'm _responsible_. Father always says so."

A girl laughs somewhere nearby, and Arno cranes his head to see someone around his own age. "You're talking to yourself!" she crows, and Arno frowns.

"I am not!"

"Butthead," the girl says, but the way she says it makes it barely sound like an insult. Arno slides off his seat anyway, running after her as she shrieks with laughter and disappears around a distant corner. He's dimly aware of the ghost man behind him, but doesn't care much.

For several long minutes, he doesn't think of Desmond at all. The girl- Elise- leads him on a rampage through the palace, and Arno finds himself being chased by guards for the first time in his life. It should be scary, but Elise keeps giggling, a constant source of ridiculous laughter at his elbow, and Arno is not afraid.

Not yet.

He does not become afraid until he sees Desmond again, looking far more confused and unhappy than he had a few minutes ago. "Why are there two of you?" he asks, tilting his head to one side, to better study the apparition.

"There's only one of me, silly!" Elise shouts, but Arno barely hears her. He turns and calls back to the other ghost, Desmond's twin or double or whatever, thinking that maybe this one will answer his questions. But to his disappointment, the two of them seem more interested in arguing with each other than giving him answers. So Arno shrugs and runs off after Elise, leaving them to their strange conversation. He's having a good time, enjoying the chance to play with a new friend, until suddenly they run into a group of people gathered in a tight knot around something Arno is far too short to see.

He pushes through the crowd, curious, and then- then he _sees_.

The watch very nearly drops from his numb fingers, but Arno remembers Desmond's warning and manages to catch it between both hands. It is the last gift he has left of his father, the last gift he will _ever _receive from the man because his father is dead on the floor in front of him, dead and bleeding when he had been so alive only a few minutes ago.

"No!" Arno shouts, the word made almost inaudible through tears. "No! You were supposed to come back! You promised, father! You promised!"

And there are hands on him, pulling him away from the dead man wearing his father's face, but Arno doesn't want to go. He hears the murmured words of the crowd, the sounds of sympathy from the ladies and judgment from the men, but he doesn't _care_. "Father!" he cries again, as he is dragged away from the bloody scene.

He is taken away, up a flight of stairs he is too numb to climb on his own, and then there is a man standing in front of him, trying to explain what's just happened, and what Arno needs to do next. Only none of his explanations make sense, because _his father is dead_, and there is no room in his head for anything else. After a while, the man leaves, and Arno is left alone.

Not for long- the door creaks open, and Arno looks up to see Elise in the doorway. He decides that this would probably surprise him, if he weren't too cold to feel anything at all. "My father is dead," he tells her.

"I saw him," Elise says, climbing onto the couch to sit next to Arno. "They came and carried him away. The servants are cleaning his blood off the floor.

Her description should make him feel worse, but oddly it doesn't. "Did they find the killer?" Arno asks.

"No." Her eyes are wide as she stares at him, and Arno realizes that she is as scared as he is. She doesn't know his father, but she'd seen the body too. He wonders if either of them will ever forget the sight.

"Oh," Arno says. Then he clenches his hand into a tight fist, and speaks in a voice that is almost a shout. "I hate him! I hate him and I wish _he _were dead instead of my father."

Elise takes his hand, gently coaxing the fist open and putting her hand inside. It's warm and alive in his, and Arno doesn't want to let go. "I hate him," he says again, more of a whisper this time, and they sit in silence for the endless minutes of solitude that follow, until finally Elise's father- the man that had carried Arno upstairs- arrives and ushers them away.

As they leave the palace, Arno is only vaguely aware of Desmond in the hall behind them, watching them go in stony silence. He barely hears the man's quiet "I'm sorry," and is sure after that he must have imagined it.


	40. Chapter 40

They gather in the Montreal safe house early the next morning, all of them physically in the same place for the first time. Desmond goes to get Shay and Edward from their times, while Altair goes for Haytham and Connor. The main room is crowded with the six of them packed around the single table large enough to hold them, but Desmond can't help thinking of the one person missing- Ezio would have been there to crack a joke and make them all feel a little bit better despite the weight of Arno's future hanging over their heads.

But he's gone, and with everyone else there, Desmond can feel his absence more than ever. It's almost physical now, and Desmond keeps expecting to turn around and see the man. To distract himself from the uncomfortable truth, he breaks the silence.

"We owe Arno a lot," he says. "We…"

But he trails off there, looking at Shay as the other man gets to his feet.

"Sorry," he says. "Can I say something?"

"Sure," Desmond says, and he willingly gives up the floor. It's not like he really wants to be the center of attention, he just can't stand the silence.

"So…" Shay looks around at the others. "This is my fault. I need to be the one to fix this, so-"

"Boo!" Edward jeers, and Shay's sharp gaze snaps around to focus on him.

"Excuse me?" he says, in a voice that makes it clear he'd heard Edward perfectly well the first time.

"Please," Edward says. "You can't just take the blame for every single thing that goes wrong."

"But this is my _fault_," Shay says.

"No," Haytham says, frowning at Shay. "He's got a point. You do have a habit of trying to take the blame all the time."

"Name one time that I-"

"Lisbon," Haytham says, and Desmond expects the violent flinch that sends Shay stumbling a step or two back. "You've spent years of your life atoning for a mistake you could not have seen coming. You've gotten in the habit of blaming yourself for everything."

"It's not healthy," Altair adds. "You can only carry so many burdens before they crush you."

"And Desmond is at least as much to blame for Arno's father as you are. No offense, Desmond."

He shrugs. Connor's not telling him anything he hadn't already known. "That's why I want to help Arno," he says. "I'll do what I can to make up for my mistakes, but I can't make it my entire life."

Shay looks around at all of them, and scowls. "Is this an intervention?"

"I guess," Edward says. "Here's the thing, Shay. You're one of us now, and that's kind of a literal thing. Like, you're really a part of us. We have to live with each other, and… you know, _in _each other. When you have a problem, we all have that problem. You can't take all the blame anymore, because we're going to help you carry it whether you want that or not."

"I do want it," Shay says, and Desmond is surprised at the conviction he can hear in his voice. "But-"

"Boo!" Edward yells again.

"He's just going to keep doing that until you stop arguing," Haytham grumbles. "Trust me."

"Hey," Edward says. "We don't have time for anyone to sit around feeling sorry for themselves. I'm just hurrying things along."

"Right," Desmond says. "So we're all going to help Arno. Not just you."

"Poor kid," Altair sighs. "Nobody deserves all of us in their head at once."

"I'll go back in the animus- shit, helix- when we're done here." Desmond rolls his eyes at the rebranding. "If it goes okay, we'll start adding more people in."

"Might as well start now," Edward says, and Desmond can't argue. It's not so much that he doesn't want to keep Arno waiting, because technically everything that's going to happen to him has already happened. It's one of the better parts of time travel.

He sets up the helix- much simpler than the animus had been, but still significantly awkward with his ancestors standing around watching. "You could help," he suggests.

"Or we could just keep sitting around and watching you do all the work," Edward says.

Connor trips over a cord at that exact moment, pulling power from the machine, and Desmond decides he's happy with them just sitting around watching after all. Then he takes a deep breath, hooks himself back into helix, and dives deep into Arno's memory.

Arno is older than he had been when Desmond last left. He's not a child anymore, and the anger and grief Desmond can feel in his mind is old and buried deep, a familiar habit that requires no conscious thought.

He stops when he feels Desmond. Just stops everything and cocks his head as if thinking hard. Desmond curses himself for not thinking to hide, but he's so used to his ancestors knowing about him that the thought hadn't even entered his mind. He's starting to think how best to explain when Arno speaks.

_"Are you a ghost, monsieur?" _

It's the first question Arno had asked him when Desmond appeared to him as a child, and Desmond is as startled by this as he is by the fact that Arno had actually thought to thin the question rather than speaking aloud. Most people take some convincing to believe the person in their head can actually hear their thoughts.

He says none of this aloud though, choosing to answer Arno's question instead. _"No," _he says.

_"So... just a man in my head."_

_"Right." _He hesitates, then goes on. _"You remember meeting me?"_

_"I remember everything from that day," _Arno says. _"Every detail. And I've been waiting a long time to find out why an invisible man appeared just before my father was murdered, and disappeared right after."_

His anger sharpens suddenly, and Desmond sighs to himself. This should be interesting.

**-/-**

**Sorry if this seems a bit like filler. It's very difficult to make Unity seem interesting, I'll be honest. Ubisoft did not leave me a lot to work with here. I'm not saying it won't be interesting later- I mean, this is the game that brought us time rifts, and those things are going to be awesome to play with. It's just going to take a while to get there while I find my footing. :/**


	41. Chapter 41

Arno sits down on the side of the street and leans against the building behind him.

_"Tell me," _he says. _"Who are you? What are you doing here? Why did you kill my father?"_ He feels very small suddenly, defenseless like the child he had been on the day he first met Desmond. He doesn't give the man a chance to answer before going on. _"I trusted you," _he says. _"I didn't know who you were, but I thought you were nice and I trusted you."_

_"I'm sorry," _Desmond says. He doesn't say anything else, but Arno gets the impression that it's more because he can't than because he won't. The sadness and regret pouring from Desmond into him is strong enough to extinguish Arno's anger, at least for the moment, and he waits with startled patience for him to go on. _"I didn't kill your father, but I… it's complicated, and I'm as much to blame as anyone."_

_"Why are you back?" _Arno asks. _"Are you going to kill me too?"_

_"No!" _Desmond says. _"No, I- oh, fuck."_

Arno is about to ask why he'd sworn when someone steps suddenly up beside him and kicks him, hard, in the side. _"You saw that coming?" _he asks as he rolls away, reaching for the wall next to him to pull himself to his feet.

_"I… have the kind of life where it's important to be aware of my surroundings," _Desmond says. _"You should move, by the way."_

Arno ducks out of the way just as a large fist comes swinging at him as a second man joins the fray, and runs.

_"You know these guys?"_

_"Yea," _Arno sighs. _"Victor and Hugo. We've had some… disagreements in the past. I don't know why they're mad at me, though. _They're_ the ones with _my_ watch."_

_"You mean your father's watch?"_

_"…yea," _Arno admits. _"I was stupid. I messed up."_

_"Do you want to get it back?"_

Arno feels his heart skip a beat, and does not hesitate to answer. _"Yes," _he says. _"More than anything." _Almost anything, because he doesn't think Desmond can bring back his father. Not even if he is a time traveling ghost.

_"Okay then," _Desmond says. _"Hold on, because this is going to feel weird."_

And it does. For a bare instant, Arno feels too crowded in his own skin as Desmond seems to grow larger inside his head. And then he realizes he is growing smaller as well, and suddenly he's nothing but a passenger along for the ride, and _Desmond _is the one in charge.

It should make Arno feel powerless, trapped within a prison made of himself. But it doesn't. Even though he isn't in control of his own body, Arno can feel every movement, things he didn't know his own body is capable of. Some of it hurts- his muscles aren't used to the exertion, and Desmond seems to revel in every chance to push Arno's body to move as quickly as possible. He takes leaps that terrify Arno, soaring over gaps that he doesn't really believe he can make.

_"This is insane!" _he protests, but Desmond is grinning and Arno, if he's honest with himself, is no less excited.

_"This is a normal day at the office," _Desmond says. _"Trust me, I know what I'm doing."_

Trust me. The last time Arno had trusted Desmond, even for a few minutes, his father had died.

The thought brings them crashing to a sudden halt, Arno tearing control of his body back from Desmond before they can go so much as another step. _"No," _he says. _"No, I don't trust you."_

_"Fair enough," _Desmond says. He pulls back, but Arno can still feel him there, waiting, watching, _regretting._ For a moment Arno feels almost guilty at pushing him away, but then he laughs aloud. Nothing he's done to Desmond can compete with what Desmond's done to him.

Only the fact that Desmond has claimed not to have killed Arno's father himself (and Arno can _feel _that this is the truth, the certainty in Desmond's mind creeping into his own) keeps him from lashing out in anger. He wants to know the name of his father's actual killer. He wants to know every detail of that day, and how Desmond is involved. But to learn any of that, he will need to keep Desmond at least moderately happy with him. So he doesn't say any of what he wants to.

_"I can do it myself," _he says, to cover up the awkwardness of the moment. By this point, he's lost his pursuers and knows he is not far from their home. That is where the watch must be, and it's not normally Arno's first instinct to break into someone else's home and steal, but… well, it's his father's watch. And now he has something to prove.

The theft itself is surprisingly simple. There's an open window next to the street, and Arno vaults over the sill in a single movement. There's no one inside, so Arno takes his time, poking around in corners and drawers until he finds what he's looking for, on a cluttered and dusty desk on the top floor. The metal weight of the watch is heavy and cold and unbearably familiar in his hand. Arno can feel the incessant tick even through the case, and it gives him a strength he had been missing until then.

_"See?" _he says, half to himself and half to Desmond. _"I can do this without your help."_

And as if that were a cue of some kind, the door downstairs slams open. Arno jumps, clutching the watch more tightly. He listens hard, but even if he hadn't he would have been able to hear the two sets of heavy footsteps on the stairs below, coming closer.

"The neighbor said he came in fifteen minutes ago" one of the men says, and Arno bites his lip as he recognizes Hugo. "But he hasn't left yet."

"Then he must still be here," says the other, and Arno isn't at all surprised to realize Hugo is still with his brother. They must have come home when he got away from them.

_"Desmond!" _he says urgently.

And Desmond could have said something. He could have said something cruel about Arno only needing him when he's in trouble, but he doesn't. Arno is incredibly grateful for this, and for the continued silence as Desmond seems to launch himself from the _third floor window_. Arno expects death. He expects to fall thirty feet to the ground and smash his head apart on the ground below.

But he doesn't. Desmond reaches out, finds a handhold, and steadies himself on the roof across the street. He turns for half a second, just long enough to see the brothers shouting in disbelief and anger.

_"Alright," _Arno says, and though the smile on his face is Desmond's, it fits his mood as well. He really does not like the pair. _"I suppose I can live with this."_

_"For now," _Desmond says. _"I think things will probably get worse."_

_"Why?"_

_"They always get worse."_


	42. Chapter 42

Altair sits in silence in the hideout, thinking about the situation with Arno and trying to make a decision. He's the only one left in the modern era apart from Rebecca (of course) and Desmond, hooked into the helix and only marginally more aware of the real world than he is when he's in an animus. The others are in Edward's time, catching up with one another, but Altair is content to wait here with Desmond.

"I used to do this a lot," he says, when Rebecca starts looking at him strangely.

"What?"

"Just sit and wait for Desmond," Altair says. "While he was looking through Connor's memories. Or- or Ezio's." He broods for a minute, remembering Ezio before moving on. "I remember, when Desmond was in Connor's memories, Ezio and I would get stuck in the future sometimes. We'd just sit around and talk. Or he would talk and I would ignore him, if he was being particularly annoying." He smiles, a bittersweet expression because the memories are good but Ezio is _gone_.

"You must miss him a lot."

"I do," Altair says. "But there's no bringing back the dead."

"Says the man from the twelfth century," Rebecca says. "You know, _your_ dead body is rotting somewhere right now."

"Most likely it's rotted away already," Altair says. The thought doesn't bother him- it had the first time he'd explored this train of thought, but he's used to it by now. "But it's different with Ezio. It's… he was in our heads, you know? We all felt him being torn away. It's a little bit like dying yourself. It's- there's no way to undo that damage now. I've thought about going back. To an earlier point of Ezio's timeline. But he wouldn't be _our _Ezio. He wouldn't be up here." He points to his head, then lets out an exasperated sigh. "I'm sorry. I realize I'm not making any sense."

"That's okay," Rebecca says. "Grief is hard, I understand. I've lost people myself."

"Most people have." At least, within the assassins most people have suffered losses.

They sit in silence for a minute, and then Desmond abruptly quits the memory he's reliving and turns around to face the two of them. "So… Arno's going to be interesting," he says. "He's stubborn-"

"He'll fit right in with the rest of you," Rebecca says, and Altair glances at Desmond and shrugs.

"Yes," Desmond agrees. "But he's fixated on finding the man that killed his father, and knows I was involved somehow. So… you know, that was interesting." His next words were spoken in such an unenthusiastic monotone that Altair did not believe them for a moment. "I can't wait for him to meet Shay."

"Maybe he should meet someone else first?" Altair suggests. "Someone that wasn't directly responsible for his father's death?"

Desmond winces. "Yea," he says. "I thought maybe Edward, if we can get him in Arno's head somehow."

"Or even in the same time period," Altair adds. "We can manage that easily enough, and figure something out from there. I just feel like it would be easier if someone he doesn't hate automatically explains everything to him."

"True," Desmond says. "We should go track him down at some point." He yawns. "I need some sleep, though."

"I'll handle it," Altair says. "I should get Haytham and Connor back to their own time, anyway."

He waits until Desmond nods and wanders off to find a bed, then draws on the power of the apple to propel himself from this century to the eighteenth.

This is only the second or third time he's been to Edward's home, and so he takes a second to orient himself. The house didn't feel like it belonged to Edward- it was neat and well maintained, usually quiet and orderly. Altair hadn't liked the _Jackdaw _much, on the general principle of disliking most ships. But it had fit Edward in a way this place does not.

He finds the man in an upstairs room, talking to Connor. The conversation is animated, and- Altair grins to himself- clearly nautical in subject matter. He hangs back, not wanting to interrupt. Edward is almost always talkative, but Connor takes more encouragement to get enthusiastic about something. It sounds like they're discussing sails, or rigging, or something. Altair has remained stubbornly ill-informed about how ships actually work, considering that Connor, Edward, and Shay are all skilled sailors.

That's probably why he hears the footsteps before either of the Kenways, and is the first to see the little boy, two or three years old, come toddling into the room. The boy glances up at Altair- who startles a little at recognizing Haytham's face, before remembering that at this point in his timeline he must be a very young child- and dismisses him as uninteresting. He considers the other two for a second, then hurries forward at what looks like top speed before throwing his arms around Connor's left leg.

Connor goes stiff for a second, looking down in obvious surprise. Edward only sighs in exasperation as he bends down to pick up his son. "Come on, Haytham," he says, with an apologetic grimace in Connor's direction. "Aren't you supposed to be having a nap?"

"Not sleepy," Haytham informs his father. "Can I stay up and play?"

"I don't know," Edward says, pretending to think the question over carefully. "You did attack my guest."

"I was playing pirates," Haytham informs him seriously.

Edward shakes his head, looking for all the world like he's been seriously disappointed. "You're not being a very _good_ pirate, are you?" he asks. "How do you expect to defend your ship by hugging?"

"He can't move fast," Haytham says.

"Hmm," Edward says, and Altair can see Haytham's face light up with pride at his next few words. "Well I can see you've thought this through very well. Can I give you some advice, though?"

Haytham nods, and listens with a solemn face as Edward whispers something into his ear. This is when Connor looks around and finally notices Altair. "Oh," he says. "I didn't see you there."

"I've only been here a minute or so," Altair says. "Where's your father?"

"Upstairs," Connor says. "I don't think he likes being back here. I don't blame him- it must be strange to go back to your childhood home and see that nothing has changed except you."

"I-"

Connor swears suddenly in his own language, something Altair has heard him do only once or twice before, and only when surprised. As he is now- Haytham has jumped from Edward's arms straight at him, laughing with delighted glee and _tickling, _of all things. Connor catches him with what looks like sheer instinct, falling over in the process.

Altair watches in silence, smiling as Haytham finds a good spot and manages to make Connor actually laugh for a moment before the man gives in and turns the tickling back on Haytham. The boy shrieks and pleads for mercy, wiggling away.

This is _good_. Strange, but good. He's in a time centuries after his own death, watching a toddler have a tickle war with the man that will one day be his son, as his ex-pirate father eggs him on. Occasionally, Edward shouts a piece of advice, and Haytham follows them as though they are precious wisdoms passed down from the ancients. It's a completely impossible scene, but Altair cannot feel anything but a warm feeling of safety and peace as he watches them. They are his family too, as strange as that may be. It's good to see them happy.

"Altair," Edward says, finally noticing him and turning. His eyes are crinkled with recent laughter, and he does not bother to hide the smile that covers most of his face. "News?"

"We need you to talk to Arno," Altair explains. "Because you're not connected to his father's death, and he needs a friendly voice in his head."

"Sure," Edward says. "I mean, I can't control when I end up in someone's head, but if I see Arno I'll try not to freak him out."

"Good enough," Altair says. Then- "Is everything going well here?"

"Oh yes," Edward says. "Just one big, messed up family."

**-/-**

**I can't stop writing tiny babies lately for some reason. Still, no regrets.**


	43. Chapter 43

Haytham finds his sister in her room, writing something in a journal that he's never seen before. It's thick and worn, clearly well used, but when she sees him hovering in the doorway she slams it shut and stuffs it away, out of sight. "Who are you?" she demands. "What do you want?"

For a moment, he's lost for words. He hadn't expected to be recognized by his younger self, because no two year old in the world would look at a man nearly fifty and realize they were the same person. And his mother is a distant and unreachable figure in most of his memories, so Haytham is not surprised when she greets him like a stranger and wanders away to some other task.

But Jenny- he's avoided her until now, because she'd always given him the impression of knowing absolutely everything when he was a child. He'd thought, if anyone here would recognize him, it would be her. But no, she's just staring at him, angry and defensive, as clueless as the others. "Sorry," he says. "I didn't mean to interrupt whatever you were doing."

"What are you doing here?" Jenny asks, refusing to be deterred. "If you're a burglar, or a kidnapper, I'll scream."

"You do that," Haytham says. There's a lump in his throat, and suddenly the memories he's been repressing for so long come lunging out from the depths of his mind. Because Jenny had been kidnapped, the day their father was killed. And it had taken him a very long time to get her back. "If that ever happens to you, you fight and you scream and you don't let them win."

She seems even more confused than before, and balls her fists. "One more chance," she says. "Who are you, and why are you here?"

His mind is utterly blank. He's thinking just enough to realize that using his real name would be a bad idea- so far, he's managed to skate past the issue with everyone else. Jenny is insistent, though, and it's clear he'll have to say something in order to satisfy him.

Something seems to crawl out of a hole in the back of his mind, and for a moment he is almost not himself. "Ezio," he says. "I'm a friend of your father's."

She seems to accept this- some of the tension goes out of her body, and she sighs. "Father has the strangest friends," she says, and Haytham can remember enough unusual visitors from his own childhood to understand why she accepts this explanation so easily. "He's downstairs, not up here."

"Thank you," Haytham says, and he makes it just barely out of sight before putting his back to the wall and closing his eyes. What on Earth had possessed him to give _Ezio's _name? Out of all the hundreds or thousands of names on the planet he could have chosen, why that one? It had just seemed so natural in the moment.

Then again, maybe it's not so strange. Ezio is dead, but there are still bits and pieces of him left in Haytham's head. A dropped name in a moment of awkward conversation is not particularly unreasonable, even if it is definitely uncomfortable.

He straightens, frowning at the moment of fear that had come from claiming Ezio's name as his own. He'd simply given Jenny the first name that came to mind- there was absolutely nothing wrong with that.

Haytham snorts and goes downstairs, pushing the entire ordeal out of his mind. He hears laughter before he sees any of the others, and finds them all gathered together in one place. Edward is speaking with Altair- when exactly had he arrived?- while Connor is playing some kind of game with his younger self.

Altair spots him first and nods in greeting.

"Anything new happening with Arno and Desmond?" Haytham asks.

"Nothing unexpected," Altair says. He smiles a little and gestures toward the smaller Haytham giggling like mad on the floor behind them. "You're adorable."

"No-"

"Yes," Edward and Connor say, in almost perfect unison. They look at each other and shrug.

"Do you remember any of this?" Altair asks.

Haytham's first instinct is to simply say no, but the truth is that when he thinks hard he might _almost _remember some of this. None of the details, of course, just a crowd of strange men he'd never seen before talking about things he doesn't understand, and being allowed to stay up through naptime for once. "Maybe," he says instead. "It was a long time ago."

Edward scoops the younger Haytham off the ground, holding him tightly because the boy seems determined to wiggle his way out of his father's arms and back to the ground. "Come on, Haytham," he grunts, forcing him to be still at last. "This is…" and then he stops, obviously faced with the problem of what name to use.

"Ezio," Haytham supplies. Then, because it's obvious his younger self has no interest whatsoever in the conversation, he explains a little. "It was the first thing that came to mind when Jenny asked me earlier."

"Not the worst possible alias," Altair says, looking at him through narrowed eyes. "And not the worst possible way of remembering him."

"It was an accident," Haytham says. "I would have said something else, but I didn't have time to think."

"Dad!"

They all turn to the boy as he whines at his father and tugs at the man's sleeve. "Who's everyone else?"

"Ah, right. Introductions." Edward points at Altair first, who is slightly closer. "This is Altair."

"Altear," the boy repeats, butchering the name completely. Altair winces a little and Haytham shoots him an _I am so sorry _look as the two year old leans up to whisper in his father's ear. In true toddler fashion, the whisper is completely audible. "All your friends have funny names."

"Haytham's not exactly a normal name either," Connor says, and the boy turns his attention toward him.

"Is too! What's _your _name, then?"

"Ratonhnhaké:ton."

The boy's mouth literally drops open at the impossibility of this name, and Haytham rolls his eyes at his son. "Connor," he corrects. "Call him Connor."

He nods, suddenly beaming. "Connor is a good name," he says. "My middle name's Connor."

"Is it?" Connor asks. He glances sideways, toward Haytham, who can only shrug in response as he gestures toward Edward. He hadn't given himself the name. Still, Connor looks downright happy about the revelation, smiling as if he's just been given a gift, and Haytham doesn't have the heart to say anything to ruin the moment.

**-/-**

**An apology for two things- first, this chapter was kind of rushed. Sorry. Second, midterms are coming up, so updates will probably not happen until sometime late next week. Sorry again. Trust me, I would rather be working on this than brushing up on 'important zoning case laws', but I'm not getting graded on writing fanfiction. :/**


	44. Chapter 44

Arno wakes abruptly in the middle of his first night in prison, to the sight of someone unknown and faintly transparent crouching over him. The man is a hair shorter than Arno, blonde and wrinkled in the way people got when they smiled a lot. He was smiling now, which made him look faintly insane given that they were in a dirty and cramped prison cell, and Arno gave him a disbelieving look before scrambling away.

"Whoa," the man says, holding his arms up defensively. "Calm down, kid, I'm not going to hurt you."

"Then what are you doing?" Arno demanded. "Were you watching me sleep?"

"Yep."

"_Why_?"

"Just curious," the man says. He sits back on the ground with his back against the wall, gesturing for Arno to join him. "Come on. Let's talk."

"Why should I talk to you?" Arno asks.

"Technically, you probably shouldn't," the man says. "Because people will start to wonder why you're having a conversation with yourself."

"I'm not," Arno says. "I'm talking to you."

"But no one can see you but me," the man says, which makes Arno blink in confusion.

"Who _are_ you?"

"Damn- I should have introduced myself, I guess." He sticks out a hand, which Arno takes hesitantly. "Edward Kenway."

"You're English?" Arno guesses.

"_Welsh_," Edward corrects. "But that's not important right now. I have to explain some stuff to you, or you're going to spend the rest of your life being really confused about why there's all these people in your head."

"Like Desmond?"

"Yea!" Edward nods emphatically. "Desmond's one of us- Desmond, Altair, me, Haytham, Connor, and Shay. We time travel into each other's heads. And yours, now."

Arno laughs, and almost collapses onto the floor next to him. "I'm going insane," he says. "That's the only explanation."

"Just wait until you end up in the future for the first time," Edward says, with obvious enjoyment. "You're going to freak out completely."

Something about the dead certainty in his voice makes Arno hesitate. "You're serious, aren't you?"

"Oh yea. Trust me, we haven't even hit the really weird stuff yet."

"Then why _me_?" Arno demands. "I don't understand anything that's happened to me since before my father died. I just want to know why you guys picked me to mess with…" his voice trails off into something like a sob, and he's horrified to feel tears leaking from the corners of his eyes. "I've lost my blood father and my adopted father. My best friend hates me. I'm in prison, and I don't know what I'm supposed to do anymore. Why can't you all just leave me alone?"

"It's not that bad," Edward says, and to Arno's extreme embarrassment, he wraps his arm around Arno's shoulders. "Don't cry."

"I'm not crying!"

"Please." Edward makes a dismissive snort that spells his feelings out very clearly. "I have a two year old son at home, I know what it sounds like when someone's trying not to cry. Seriously, Arno, I'm not going to judge you."

For a second, Arno struggles to decide if he believes this, and then he's flat out crying and it's too late to pretend it matters. He cries in absolute silence, but his whole body shakes and his face is soaked through with tears. Everything that's happened over the past few days comes rushing through his mind until he can't help but sob with the tragic unfairness of it all. To his credit, Edward says absolutely nothing, just holds him tight and waits for the tears to stop. It takes a while, but eventually Arno finds himself dry eyed and feeling oddly empty.

"I'm still so confused," he says at last. "Seriously, who are you people? How do you time travel?"

"Well," Edward says carefully. "If you're okay with it, I can get inside your head and give you some of what I know."

A few hours ago, Arno would never have considered it. If it had been Desmond asking- Desmond, who Arno still isn't sure he can trust- he would have said no on general principal. But Edward seems sort of alright. "Sure," he says at last. "Why not?"

Edward nods, and the next thing Arno knows, he's pressed his forehead right up against Arno's. He can smell Edward's breath on his face, small puffs of air as he concentrates hard on something, see every line on his face. Then Edward pushes farther forward, and Arno has half a second to think that there should be no room for him to do this, before Edward's half invisible form has disappeared inside Arno's own body.

He takes a breath- feels the disorienting confusion of another mind settling down inside his own- and lets it out again. Edward fits more comfortably than Desmond, maybe because Arno trusts him more, maybe for some other reason he can't explain. _"Okay," _he says. _"Give me what you know."_

And Edward does. The knowledge flows into Arno like a flood, so that he almost drowns under the weight of it all. _"Slow down!" _he begs, and Edward offers a half-hearted apology before retreating a little.

With the information coming more slowly, Arno has an easier time processing what he's learning. Sort of- Edward's story is still impossible to believe and difficult to understand, but he's so utterly convinced (and Arno can actually _feel_ that conviction in his mind, even as his own doubts struggle to make themselves heard) that it's hard to stay skeptical.

_"I don't know what to say to that," _he says. _"I mean, that's really- that's a lot."_

_"You'll get used to it," _Edward says cheerfully. _"It can even be pretty fun, if you let it."_

_"Sure," _Arno says glumly. _"Fun. With the men that killed my father in my head." _He knows now, thanks to Edward, that Desmond and Shay had not meant for his father to die, that they had been genuinely trying to do what they thought best with no context or information at all. It doesn't make him feel much better.

_"They're really not bad people," _Edward says, but hesitantly, as if he knows how unconvincing this argument sounds.

_"We'll see," _Arno says. _"We'll see."_

**-/-**

**I'm back! Cool! But you know what's not cool? The plot in Unity is such a mess, I have no idea what to write with Arno. Ugh. And of course I can't replay it to get my details straight because there is literally no way to start a new save game for Unity...**

**(Side note- if anyone knows how to restart the game using a PS4, I would love to hear it)**

**Anyway, rant over! The point I was trying to get at is that I don't have a super awesome grasp on the plot, so if things end up out of order or just plain wrong... yea, that's why.**


	45. Chapter 45

Connor startles and stops dead in his tracks as someone new creeps their way into his mind. He feels a flash of fear, a pulling and stretching as the stranger tries to get away from him as quickly as possible. Connor frowns and shakes his head, forcing the visitor down and back, retaining control only because of months of practice. Shay's truly infuriating habit of 'borrowing' bodies whenever he disagrees with whatever the person in question was doing is not something Connor had been willing to put up with for long.

_"Who are you? Where is this?"_

_"Not now," _Connor says. _"I'm hunting."_

_"But-"_

This is the first afternoon of peace Connor has been allowed in nearly two weeks, and he is not willing to give it up. Not even knowing how worried they have all been about getting Arno on their side is enough to distract him from this afternoon.

Haytham has been ill. It's a quiet kind of sickness, one that has developed slowly in the couple of weeks since Edward had first tried talking to Arno. There has been little progress since then, although Arno does seem to be warming up to Edward a little. Most of the others are extremely interested in this, and so Connor is the only one to notice his father slowly growing ill.

He's pale and quiet, rarely eating and trembling when he moves. It's frightening for Connor to watch, this slow decay, and the worst part is that he doesn't understand it. Haytham refuses to even admit there's anything wrong with him, much less ask for help. So Connor has spent the last two weeks worrying and trying everything he can think of to help- nothing has worked yet, and today Connor decides he _needs _the day off, just to relax and stop thinking about Haytham for a while.

Not even Arno's sudden appearance is going to distract him from that, not for a while at least. He spends some time panicking in the back of Connor's head, only calming again after an hour or more of adjustment. Connor does his best to ignore him, focusing on the land around him and his immediate goals, rather than the upset stranger in the back of his head.

It's good to stop thinking for a while and just let muscle memory take over. By the time he finally stops, in the split between two tree branches, he's sweating and breathing hard, and feeling slightly better than he had been before.

_"What are you worried about?" _Arno asks, tentatively. _"Am I allowed to talk now?"_

_"Yea…" _he frowns, distracted and upset. _"Um- sorry. I just really needed…" _He groans aloud and rubs at his face. This isn't like him at all, but with everything that's been going on lately he needs _someone_ to talk to, and Arno is right there in his head. _"My dad's sick. And I don't know what to do."_

_"Oh."_

_"Yea…" _and he's surprised at the sympathy coming through from Arno, because although he hasn't been paying much attention, he's kind of gotten the idea that Arno actively hates all of them. He hadn't meant to let Arno see what he's thinking, but apparently some of it filters through.

_"They did kill my father," _he points out. _"Desmond and Shay. So I- what else am I supposed to do?"_

_"I don't know."_

_"How would you feel, if your father's illness was someone else's fault? If you found out that someone gave him something that made him sick, or poisoned him, or hurt him like that?"_

_"I-"_

But it makes something click, and suddenly Connor is breathless and pale, grasping desperately at the tree branches to keep from falling.

_"What's wrong?"_

_"His illness _is _someone's fault," _Connor says. _"I didn't think- I forgot. But I've seen these symptoms before, and…. Yea, it's someone's fault."_

_"Whose?"_

_"Mine."_

He drops from the tree with less than his usual grace, running in the direction of the house as fast as he possibly can, ignoring Arno's frantic questions. This is his fault. In the alternate universe where Connor had gained the power to turn into a wolf, eagle, and bear, and then subsequently lost his mind, Haytham had also had a dose of the tea. So far there haven't been any signs that it's done to Haytham what it had done to Connor, but- well, Ziio had said that _no one _could avoid the effects forever. And although Connor had been more aware of what was going on inside his head than in the rest of his body at the time, Haytham's symptoms seem to match.

"Dad." He eventually stops in the doorway of the room his father has taken as his own.

Haytham is in bed- despite it being well past noon, a rarity for him- reading something Connor doesn't bother looking closely at.

"Connor..?" he frowns, and Connor notices the pale, almost paper white, expression on his face.'

"It's the panther," Connor says. "In your head. That's why you've been sick."

Haytham nods without bothering with a denial. "Yes."

"You should have said something."

"I have," Haytham says. "I've been talking to Shay and Desmond, working on reproducing the cure that helped you."

"But-"

"Desmond's pretty sure it has something to do with the apple- concentrating the energies into a liquid form."

"It's-"

"I'll be fine in a week or so," Haytham says. "Don't _worry_, Connor."

Connor is silent. "You'll really be fine?"

"You're really worried?"

They stare at each other for a moment, then Connor snorts and turns away. "No," he says. "Of course not. You can take care of yourself."

Haytham shakes his head. "No," he says. "We take care of each other." It's an unusually touchy moment for the two of them, but Connor really _is _worried (even if he pretends he isn't), and Haytham _is _sick (even if he says he'll be fine soon).

_"You take care of each other," _Arno repeats when Connor has left the room. _"Really?"_

_"Yea," _Connor says. _"Whatever happens. I know I can count on every one of them."_

_"Must be nice."_

Connor sighs. _"You're one of us too, you know," _he says.

_"Yea," _Arno says. _"Sure."_

_"Listen- Shay made a huge mistake. Desmond let it happen. But I know both of them would do whatever it takes to make it up to you, if you just gave them a chance."_

Arno is still doubtful, Connor can feel it. But a minute ago he'd been absolutely convinced that reconciliation would be impossible. This is a step in the right direction at least.

"Hey! Connor."

He turns and it's Desmond behind him, appeared out of his own century with a silent abruptness, holding a mug of something. Connor stares at it and Desmond makes a too late effort to hide it behind his back.

"That's for my father?"

"Yea," Desmond says. "So… he told you?"

Connor nods. "Well, I guessed. But yes. Is that going to help him?"

"Hopefully. It's just stuff from the apple liquefied." He grins a little. "Apple juice, I guess you could call it."

Connor opens his mouth to ask how Desmond can even do that, but the other man's always been good with the apple in a way none of the rest of them are.

_"Can I talk to him?"_

_"You _want _to talk to Desmond?"_

_"No. But I want this all behind me. Us. I want it over with."_

By this point, Desmond has gone inside to talk to Haytham, and Connor finds himself distracted.

_"Connor?" _Arno prompts.

_"Yea," _Connor says. _"You can talk to him when he's done with my dad."_

_"Fair enough," _Arno says, and doesn't complain when Connor settles down to wait.


	46. Chapter 46

Haytham watches Desmond, and Desmond watches him.

They're separated by no more than a few feet of empty space, but Haytham feels like there's a sold wall there, dividing them and cutting him off from everyone else. "Are you sure this is going to work?"

Desmond shrugs one shoulder. "No."

"Is it going to make it worse?"

"I really hope not," Desmond says. "But I have no idea. I tried replicating that stuff that helped Connor, but it's not an exact science."

"Never become a doctor, Desmond," Haytham says. "You have a terrible bedside manner."

"Here." Desmond tosses him the vial of golden liquid. "Up to you, drink it or not, whatever."

"You mean, drink it and maybe be cured, or maybe get better-"

"Or completely lose your mind and turn into some kind of werebeast, yea."

"Seriously, Desmond," Haytham snaps. "Bedside manner." But he studies the vial anyway, considering it carefully, analyzing every possible outcome. After a while he says, "I had a dream last night."

"Anything interesting?"

"I grew fangs. And claws. And then I tore Connor to pieces." He says it matter of factly, because if he adds any emotion at all he won't be able to have this conversation.

"It was just a dream."

"It wasn't. When I woke up, I had fangs. And claws. Connor wasn't in, but Ziio was. And I almost…"

"Drink the vial," Desmond says. He's gone very still, and Haytham doesn't have to be inside his head to know how worried he is. "Please. We all saw what happened to Connor. He almost lost his mind, you know how _animal _he was at the end."

He does, but still he hesitates to open the vial. "I really don't want to get worse."

"Alright, fine," Desmond says. "Let's look at it this way, okay? Connor got _his _cure from Shay, who got it from me at some point in his future. I can't give it to him unless I already know how to make it, and I'm not going to learn unless I get it right with you, first."

"Fine," Haytham says. "But that's low. Just for the record."

He uncorks the vial and drinks it down. For a second, nothing happens, and Haytham has a sarcastic comment ready on the tip of his tongue. But then something squeezes him, tight around the chest, something cold and unbearably solid even if it does only exist in his mind. His body spasms on the bed, and he's vaguely aware of Desmond suddenly on his feet and moving toward him. But the words he's saying (urgent and questioning) don't make sense.

Haytham shouts out in pain and fear, and suddenly there are heavy footsteps and Connor's in the room with them. And Haytham wants to tell him to _leave_, because he doesn't want him hurt and he doesn't want him to see this, but he can't make his tongue work the right way, and he can't force out anything that sounds human. He's snarling, angry and afraid, and his chest still hurts.

And then… the next thing he knows is something jumping out from inside him. It hurts when it leaves, and Haytham is vaguely aware of his own voice screaming and screaming until his throat goes hoarse. It's only barely audible over the sound of the panther in the room, growling and snarling at everyone and everything.

He opens his eyes, and the first thing he sees is Connor, angry and powerful, an avenging figure striking at the panther as it bares its teeth and prepares to leap. One well aimed strike from his tomahawk and the beast collapses, blood pouring from a wound in his neck. And Haytham gives a shuddering gasp, an unhappy sigh. The beast had taken _so much _from him. He's just tired, now.

"Dad-" Connor is at his side, hand wrapped around Haytham's. "It's gone."

"I know," he says. "Thank you, son." He took a deep breath, and noticed the wheeze in his chest. "It's not fun though, is it?"

"No," Connor says. "Not at all. Are you- are you going to be okay?"

"Yea," Haytham says, with a solid attempt at bravado. "Of course. Even you couldn't kill me when you tried, remember? I'm sure this won't be able to either."

Connor frowns as though Haytham has somehow insulted his professional pride. "I _would _have killed you," he says. "Except Desmond interfered, with the apple."

"And you're welcome for that," Desmond says from the end of the bed. "Seriously? You're completely hopeless, both of you."

"Absolutely," Haytham agrees. "It's a Kenway family trait." His words are met with a surprised laugh from Connor. "You've met my father, haven't you?"

"And I'm grateful that he's not here right now," Desmond says. "I'm sure he'd find some way to make this all unnecessarily complicated."

"You just liquified the energy from an ancient device powered by science we can't even understand to drive an animal out of my head," Haytham says.

"Yes, I know but-"

"An animal which was only there in the first place because of a tea I drank in another universe."

"Alright, I see your point-"

"Which was then killed by my son, who gave me said tea in the first place. I don't see how my father could possibly make this situation _more _complicated."

"I think you're underestimating Edward," Connor says. The smile vanishes from his face and voice, then. "Are you… you'll be alright, won't you?"

"Of course," Haytham says. "I just need some rest."

"Then we'll leave," Desmond says, and Haytham hears two pairs of footsteps leaving the room as he closes his eyes. He still does not feel particularly well, very weak and tired after the last several minutes.

But then, perhaps a rest will help…

**-/-**

**Next chapter: Desmond and Arno attempt to reconcile**


	47. Chapter 47

In the end, Arno has to borrow Connor's body to have his conversation with Desmond. Connor tries to explain how Arno can pull out of his head and become a ghost that only he and Desmond will be able to see, but Arno can't quite get the hang of it. He's too new to all the strangeness- he can't quite wrap his head around any of this. Connor eventually gives up and retreats to the back of his own head, where he watches carefully but allows Arno free reign of his body.

He does it abruptly, leaving Connor so suddenly in control that he freezes up for a moment and can't do anything but stare. Cautiously, he moves his- Connor's hands. They're large and calloused, darker than Arno's and freckled from the sun. Arno clenches one into a fist, then jumps a little as a blade shoots out of a bracer on the other forearm.

_"What's that?" _he demands.

_"Just-" _he can feel Connor tensing up. _"Please try not to stab me."_

_"But what is it?"_

_"It's called a hidden blade," _Connor says, and Arno stares at the carefully polished steel. _"Assassins use it. Now put it away and concentrate, alright?"_

Assassins. Right. In all the sudden excitement, he's managed to forget that these are assassins he's sharing bodies with.

"Arno?" Desmond says, and he looks up guiltily. "Are you okay? You're just kind of… staring."

"Sorry," Arno says, and jumps a little when the voice that comes out is Connor's instead of his. The hidden blade snaps back into place, and Arno realizes he's shaking a little. "This is all new to me."

"Take your time," Desmond says.

_"Not too much time," _Connor adds.

He wants to be out of this body as soon as possible anyway. "I think I've been a bit of a prick about all this," he says. "I… I'm tired of being angry." He waits, hoping Desmond will interrupt, but he doesn't. He just sits still and waits for Arno to say everything that needs to be said. "My father is dead. You and Shay acted without all the information, but I've been in your head. You didn't mean it. And I… there's enough hatred in the world. It's been over a decade. I think it's time I tried forgetting for once. Besides, I-" he swallows, hard. "I watched the way all of you take care of each other, and I would…" the rest of his words come out all in a rush, before he can think better of them. "I'm in a lot of trouble, and I would really like someone watching out for me."

He stares down at the table, at Connor's unfamiliar hands, feeling his face turn slowly red. "I'm sorry," he continues, when Desmond says nothing. "I know I haven't been friendly, or forgiving. But in my time I'm in prison. I don't know what's going on, but-"

"Arno," Desmond interrupts. He sounds exasperated. "Shay and I have been hoping you would forgive us for what we did since we realized what a mistake it was. And if you want help with some kind of weird stuff going on in your life, then you have found exactly the right people."

_"We know all about weird stuff," _Connor adds helpfully, and Arno manages half a laugh. It feels unnatural in Connor's chest, like the man doesn't laugh a lot. It makes Arno pause a moment, really considering for the first time what it means to be in someone else's body. It's not just being bigger, or older. He feels more somber in Connor's head, quieter and cautious. Not really like himself at all.

_"You'll get used to it," _Connor reassures him.

_"I'm not sure I want to," _Arno says. _"Do you want your body back?"_

Connor assents and after an awkward few moments of shuffling Connor is back in control, with Arno more comfortably settled into the back of his head. Before, it had been awkward to be so helpless and out of control in another man's body. Now it feels safe. Like being wrapped in a warm blanket, with someone he trusts standing guard between him and the threats of the rest of the world. He's not afraid anymore.

_"…you're a lot like a cat, Arno," _Connor says, startling Arno out of his distraction.

_"What?"_

_"You screech and wave your claws at anyone that tries to come near you, hurting even the people that want to help you. And then when you're satisfied, you curl up and purr."_

_"I'm not-"_

But he pretty much _is _curled up in Connor's head, so Arno finds the accusation hard to argue. He grumbles a token protest and falls into a contented silence, instead. It is a comfort, a good rest before the world dissolves around him and suddenly he's back in his own body and his own time, filthy and sore from spending the night in a prison cell. But he's not alone, not anymore. He can feel someone in his mind- he quests out, recognizes Connor.

_"Thanks for coming," _he says, softly. It's odd to have their situation so suddenly reversed, with Connor riding along in Arno's head, instead of the other way around.

_"I didn't exactly have a choice," _Connor says. _"I can't control when I time travel. None of us can, apart from Desmond and Altair. Most of the time." _He changes the subject abruptly. _"Isn't that your watch?"_

And Arno looks up, takes in the man on the opposite side of the cell. Frowns. _"No," _he says, pushing himself to his feet. _"It is my father's."_ And when he crosses the cell to get it back, it is easier than it should be, because Connor is with him the whole way.

**-/-**

**Aaaaaand Arno gives up being stubborn and decides to be friendly. :) So now that he's cooperating, and I've watched some playthroughs of Unity on youtube (thank you to everyone that suggested that), the plot is on it's way back to being on track.**


	48. Chapter 48

The man laughs in Arno's face when he demands his father's watch back, but eventually he does give it up. The man is decidedly strange, Connor decides, talking in circles and evading questions, all with an arrogant manner that implies Arno is an idiot that knows nothing. By the time he's called him a pisspot for the third or fourth time in five minutes, Connor has gone from mildly amused, to confused, to flat out annoyed. Clearly his feelings are shared by Arno, who has absolutely no idea why this stranger should have singled him out for dislike.

And then the man- Bellec- tosses Arno a stick, and gestures at him to fight.

_"I… don't know how to fight," _Arno says. He sounds nonplussed at the direction this encounter has suddenly gone.

_"We'll have to work on that," _Connor says. He looks Bellec over with a critical eye, noticing that behind his casual, almost lazy façade there are clear marks of experience. This is a man that knows what he's doing, even if he does like to show it off a little too much. _"But for now- do you mind if I help?"_

He feels a momentary flicker of surprise- Arno is clearly not quite used to having anyone to help him, much less someone actually inside his head. Then the man nods.

"Come on, pisspot," Bellec calls. "You're not afraid to fight me, are you?"

And Connor says, "No."

The look of absolute surprise on Bellec's face as he stumbles into a hasty defensive stance. Connor keeps his strikes slower and clumsier than he would normally. He wants to unsettle the man, not make an enemy out of him.

"Alright!" Bellec calls at last. "That's enough, pisspot." Connor surrenders control back to Arno, satisfied with the victory. "Clearly you've had some training."

"No, actually," Arno says, and Bellec's face goes a deeper shade of red. "Just… a helpful friend. Always willing to lend a hand."

_"Arno," _Connor says, as Bellec looks at him strangely. _"Did you just say I would lend a hand because I literally used your hand to fight?"_

_"…possibly."_

_"That's a terrible joke, and you should feel ashamed of yourself."_

Arno grins broadly in response.

Over the next few months, Connor is in and out of Arno's head, as are the others. Under any other circumstances, it would undoubtedly have been an unhappy time. But somehow the prison cell turns into a safe place, somewhere that they can actually get to know each other, and start to put the mistakes of the past behind them.

And all the time, Arno is learning. Bellec gives him a sketchy and brief account of the assassins, which the rest of them fill in with more specific and accurate information. He's a decent if impatient swordsman though, and Connor finds that Arno rarely needs to be corrected on anything Bellec tells him of fighting. He does take the time to teach Arno to counter an attack and turn the momentum back on his opponent. Apparently it's not something the French order values, although Connor can't begin to fathom why not.

There is little else to do in the confines of the Bastille other than train, and Arno takes to the discipline with an almost shocking talent. _"Have you had training before this, actually?" _Connor asks one day, a while on.

_"No."_

_"You fight like you have," _Connor tells him. _"You're good."_

Arno bursts with pride for a moment, before trying to hide it under a casual veneer. _"I know," _he says. _"I-"_

That's when the first cannon shot rips apart the peace of the afternoon. Arno is working with Bellec, again, but he freezes at the sound, confused and clearly not recognizing it. Connor, on the other hand, has been in enough sea battles- first his own, and then Edward's, and finally Shay's- to know exactly what it is.

"What is it?" Arno demands.

_"Cannon," _Connor says.

"An opportunity," says Bellec, a fierce and almost disturbing light in his eyes. "Come on, pisspot. We're breaking out of here."

"What, now?"

"Can you think of a better time?" Bellec laughs. "Come on, we may not get another chance as good as this one!"

"But-"

_"Arno, go," _Connor says, interrupting the protest he can feel on Arno's mind. _"I'm agreeing with him, so you know you'd have to be crazy to pass this chance up."_

_"I'm- I don't know how to do this! This is normal for you I guess, but I'm not the kind of guy that breaks out of jail and-"_

_"Then you'd better learn to be that kind of guy very quickly!" _Connor said. _"Come on, get moving."_

_"Can you-"_

_"I'm not doing this for you, Arno. You do this on your own, or not at all."_

Arno takes a few aimless steps toward the wall, runs a hand through his hair, takes a deep breath, and nods. "Alright," he says. "Let's go."

And they do. Connor watches through Arno's eyes as the man fights his way through waves of guards, out of the cells and up to the roof. That's when Bellec takes a step forward, and vanishes off the roof into what Connor recognizes as a very proficient leap of faith. It leaves Arno sputtering in indignant disbelief.

_"Don't make me do that."_

_"Arno-"_

_"I'm not jumping off a building!"_

_"It's not just jumping off a building," _Connor explains. _"It's called a leap of faith, and assassin's have been doing it since- well, since Altair was a child at least."_

_"So basically forever," _Arno says. He takes a deep breath and peers over the edge. He takes a deep breath, closes his eyes, and follows Bellec off the edge. Except there's an uneven stone in the way, and he trips more than falls. For a second it's nothing but an off balance, terrifying free fall, and then Connor begins to nudge him into a better position.

He doesn't actually take control, just guides Arno so that his limbs are better positioned and his weight evenly distributed. Then, in one lingering, timeless moment, the leap of faith is perfect. Arno opens his eyes, and Connor hears and feels his tiny gasp as he sees the open sky above them.

"Wow," he says.

And then they hit the pile of hay in the cart on the bottom, and Connor feels Arno start to smile.


	49. Chapter 49

Altair is in his head on the day that Arno is initiated as a novice in the French order of assassins. Arno is sort of grateful for that- he's still not sure about joining the brotherhood, but Altair's pride in him is enough to soothe away some of his lingering fears. He's slowly getting to know the people that (for better or for worse) are sharing his head. They're not one mass of people anymore, they're six individuals with their own personalities and opinions. Sometimes it gets a little chaotic, especially when there's more than one around, but he's starting to pick things apart.

For example, it's obvious that Altair is the one that holds the most pride for the order as an entity. He is the oldest, the one with the greatest influence over the future of the order, and he's _proud_ of Arno for joining, in a way that no one has been since his father died. It's exactly what he needs at the moment, after meeting with Elise, after learning that the death of her father is his fault. He can't stop noticing that his responsibility for Elise's father is jarringly similar to Desmond and Shay's responsibility for his own father. Forgiveness comes much more easily when he realizes how easy it is to make horrible mistakes.

And joining the assassins seems an easy way to show that forgiveness. He has accepted the half dozen insane men inside his head, the least he can do is accept the order they fight for. He gets halfway through the ceremony before Altair starts to recognize that something is wrong. Or different, more accurately.

_"That's… not typical," _he says, and Arno hears the concern in his voice as the council orders Arno to drink. _"What's in that goblet?"_

_"This isn't normal?"_

_"Maybe in this time." _He sighs. _"It does seem that the assassins in this time are more prone to… dramatics." _Arno glances up at the silently watching council and can't help but agree.

_"I'm going to drink it," _he decides.

_"You don't even know what it is!"_

_"So?"_

_"So-" _Altair sounds exasperated. _"You would just put any strange liquid in your mouth?"_

_"Apparently," _Arno says, and keeps himself from smiling only because of the severity of the atmosphere around him.

He raises the goblet and drinks. It smells sweet but the taste on his tongue is dark, and the goblet falls from his numb fingers before he can stop it. Gravity betrays him, and he stumbles forward. His mind feels like fireworks are exploding against the inside of his skull, and he closes his eyes against the pain and numbness.

When he opens them again, he's greeted by some kind of nightmare dreamscape, all fire and no logic. He's back in Versailles, and he can hear his father's voice and he knows that if he can just _get_ there, there's still enough time to save him-

He stumbles forward, half blind and senseless. There is someone in his head calling his name, but it doesn't matter. All that matters is getting to his father before it's too late. He runs, hard and fast, but it's not fast enough and he stumbles and then he's on the ground and-

There are hands on his back, on his arms, on his shoulders. Pulling him to his feet, carrying his weight, helping him forward when he can't walk on his own.

And Shay says, _"You don't need to keep running, Arno."_

_"He's stubborn," _Altair complains.

_"Fits right in,"_ says Desmond.

_"Shush,"_ Haytham scolds them_. "This isn't the time."_

_"But really," _Connor says. _"Arno, be more careful."_

_"Unless you _like_ these hallucinations," _Edward says.

_"No," _Arno gasps. _"No, I don't. What are you- you're all here." _He can feel them in his head, now that he's a little calmer.

_"You're welcome," _Altair says. _"I went and got them, since you weren't listening to me on my own."_

_"Thank you," _Arno says. _"I can't deal with these memories on my own…"_

This is the first time that he really understands what it means to be able to rely on the people in his head. He had appreciated them in his jail cell, when they helped him learn to fight, but now he needs them to lean on, and they are there for him, no questions asked. With them helping him, he is able to walk with confidence, to cut through the hallucinations until he is back on the floor of the council chambers, glaring up at the men and woman that have drugged him.

He has passed their test- he can see the satisfaction in their eyes as they nod and order that he be given a hidden blade. But Arno barely cares about that. He is more concerned with the strength that comes from the people in his head.

The weight on his left forearm is familiar and comfortable, even though he has never worn the weapon before. He knows it from Altair, and Edward, and Haytham, and Shay, and Connor, and Desmond. Strapping the hidden blade on feels like coming home after a long time away. It feels safe in a way that nothing has for a long time. Because Arno feels at last that he is really one of them. That he is more than just a mistake they need to atone for, or a child that needs careful minding. He is an assassin. One of them.

_"Laa shay'a waqi'un moutlaq bale kouloun moumkine," _Someone says, in a voice of one repeating words carefully memorized and given great meaning. The voice is strong and proud but not familiar, and it is quickly drowned by the tumult of six others in his mind. The voice fades away, and he forgets about it within moments.


End file.
